• Live
    • Audio Only
  • google plus
  • facebook
  • twitter
News > China

China's Health Workers Are Frontline Fighters Against the Virus

  • Man walks in the empty shopping area of Sanlitun in Beijing, China, Feb. 14 2020.

    Man walks in the empty shopping area of Sanlitun in Beijing, China, Feb. 14 2020. | Photo: EFE

Published 14 February 2020
Opinion

So far over 1,700 doctors and nurses became infected while preventing the spread of coronavirus.

China’s National Health Commission deputy director Zeng Yixin informed that extensive and strenuous working days are putting pressure on health workers who are physically and psychologically stressed.

RELATED:

China: Possible Cases Increase Due to New Diagnostic Criteria

He called on hospitals' authorities to distribute shifts rationally while proposing to reward the staff with more vacations when the outbreak remits and offer them psychological support.​​​

Thanks to the Chinese doctors and nurses, measures to contain the spread of the epidemic would not be possible. However, their effort has also been accompanied by greater exposure to risk.

So far 1,716 health workers have been infected with the virus and six have already died.

The Finance Ministry allocated US$3.7 billion to acquire medical supplies and to improve the conditions of health workers.

Also, medical personnel who are directly exposed to the virus will receive a salary supplement of up to US$43 per day.

On Friday, the Chinese health authorities also announced that the number of new cases registered outside the province of Hubei has declined for ten consecutive days. But there's still too much to do.

Chen Yixin, a member of the committee responsible for overseeing the crisis management in Hubei, said that the number of infected people has not yet been estimated with certainty in the city of Wuhan.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, has left 1,380 dead and more than 63,500 confirmed cases in China. Hubei Province records 81 percent of cases and 96 percent of deaths.

Up to now, 6,700 people have been discharged because they managed to overcome the disease.

Comment
0
Comments
Post with no comments.