By Opera.com
After employing over 500 workers to work, including electricians, the police and several other stakeholders, China finally opened a 1,000-bed capacity hospital in Huangzhou District to treat people infected with coronavirus.
The hospital, which was built and completed in 48 hours caught the world by surprise and admired the responsiveness of the government to the out break of the coronavirus.
The hospital in Huangzhou District
The hospital was originally scheduled to open in May, but due to the urgency, resources, and intensity, were put into making sure the hospital opened as fast as possible.
The 1,000-bed capacity hospital was initiated to combat the coronavirus in the Wuhan area of China.
Efforts have been made to contain this epidemic but a lasting cure has not been found yet.
Local authorities announced, last Friday that work will immediately start as the issue of coronavirus is a threat, not just to the people of China, but to the international community.
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Processors
As of Wednesday, it had water, electricity and internet, ready for patients.
Another ambitious project is said to be on the way in the Wuhan area and a deadline has been given by the local authority.
The government of other nations would do well to learn from China and it’s responsiveness to national health and security.
Fully equipped for coronavirus
Meanwhile, there are more than 50 Malawian students in China’s Hubei provincial capital and academic city of Wuhan.
Reporting on Nyasa Times on Thursday from Shandong, China, Bright Mhango Wuhan’s coronavirus outbreak ground zero has killed 170 people and close to 7,000 people have been infected.
He wrote that countries such as the United States, Japan and the United Kingdom are evacuating their citizens but the Malawi government has not made such arrangement.
Situation on the ground
“This has caused panic among the Malawians there as they are running out of cash and supplies,” he said.
Mhango contacted Malawi Ambassador to China, Charles Namondwe, who dismissed the Malawian students’ call to be evacuated, saying those who want to leave Wuhan would have to do so on their own.
He is qouted as saying the Chinese authorities are in constant contact with him and are calling on everyone to “stay calm and confident” that the issues would be resolved.
“However, Namondwe warned that the issue may take time to go away and declined to comment on the students request for an allowance top-up indicating that it was an issue his superiors in Malawi would be better placed to tackle.”
Mhango said he got in touch with the Malawian students through a Chinese social networking ‘App We-Chat’ and what their most urgent need was that they ran are out of food.
Mhango said the students names were not requested but their authenticity was verified and quoted one of them as saying: “We have been on lockdown for eight days now.
“Shops are closed, as you might have heard. They are only opening specific ones at specific points and times, mostly two to three hours.
“Going there is a personal risk as no one knows who has been exposed to what and where. Prices of commodities have gone higher than the usual, and it is a hustle to actually buy what you need as the demand is high,” the student is quoted as saying.
According to Mhango’s report, a Bachelors Degree students on scholarship in China get 2,500 Yuan (K265 000) stipend per month but while that may seem a lot in Malawi, it is just enough in China to cover one’s basic needs like food, electricity, internet, drinking water and, in some cases, pay to shower.
When the coronavirus began to get serious, Wuhan, the capital of Hubei Province in central China, announced a lockdown, with roads getting closed, flights grounded, trains cancelled and public places cordoned in a bid to prevent the spread of the virus.
State-run CGTN reported that World Health Organisation (WHO) director-general Tedros Adhanon Ghebreyesus said evacuation of nationals from Wuhan are not recommended.
He instead called for calm, saying he was confident in China’s response to the outbreak.—Additional reporting by Duncan Mlanjira