Even under normal circumstances, China's medical system has always been overwhelmed and stretched to near breaking point. Go to any Shanghai emergency room on a normal day or evening. You will find every single chair occupied and patients sitting on stools or on the floor in the hallway. Only the most serious cases are given a gurney. The rest are given an IV or a cup of meds and sent back out into the waiting area. Average time to see a doctor is anywhere between 2-6 hours. This current epidemic is basically a high velocity rifle bullet going through tightly packed flesh and organs. The impact is creating a massive shock driven wound cavity that the system simply cannot move or bend for. And this is creating incredibly destructive consequences. From my experiences in the Chinese healthcare system from receiving treatment there in the past, I can confidently say that this is a system that never prepares for emergencies. It's operations are based on a "think of the present only" routine. No effort is made on preparing treatment space, increasing personnel and arranging for rapid movement of supplies in the event of a mass casualty situation. If this epidemic had been a mass shooting or arson instead, we would still see much higher casualties and chaos over there than other places around the world. And before any snot faced liberal thinks "But... But... China has socialized healthcare and it is better than the USA, reeeee!"........ There is absolutely NOTHING socialist about China's current government system. All health insurance carriers are private and in order to get insurance, you HAVE to work. No if's or buts. If you do not have coverage, you are expected to pay for EVERY service that you get in the facility. Everything is money based. Cash, credit, traveler's checks, COD's, whatever. If you are not a contributing member of your community, best not even show your face in social circles. The people there value masculinity, toughness, FACE, pride, and public image on a far greater scale than your average urban westerner. The best term to label China's current government would be a corporatist centralized state. 60% fascism, 40% ultra-nationalism, and 0% socialist. The real communist period lasted from roughly 1950, with the initiation of the 'People's Land and Agricultural Reforms', to the dissolution of the Gang of Four in 1978. A mere 28 years. It was a model that simply cannot be sustained and the country had been driven into near civil war by it's end.
Heartbreaking stories from the ground zero of a biological brush fire...
A Hubei resident recounts his wife’s final days, and his battle to save her.
www.sixthtone.com
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Weng Qiuqiu never learned what killed her.
The disease moved fast. Over the course of just 12 days, the 32-year-old resident of Huanggang City in China’s central Hubei province went from complaining of a headache and cough to being diagnosed with an “unknown” type of pneumonia and put on a respirator, says her husband Chen Yong. Finally, on Jan. 21, 2020, after burning through 200,000 yuan ($29,000) in less than two weeks — the totality of their life’s savings plus everything they could raise from family, friends, and a crowdsourcing campaign — and with no sign of improvement, Chen agreed to take his wife off life support.
For weeks, Hubei has been wracked by a novel coronavirus epidemic that has sickened thousands and left over 100 dead, according to official figures. But even these numbers may not tell the full story. On Jan. 24, a research group affiliated with Wuhan University hospital warned doctors that the novel coronavirus’ wide-ranging symptoms make it difficult to identify and treat.
Weng’s death certificate says only that she died of “septic shock, respiratory failure, and severe pneumonia.” Chen still doesn’t know if she had the novel coronavirus, or if such a diagnosis could have saved his wife’s life. Huanggang lies just over 75 kilometers away from the provincial capital of Wuhan, where the outbreak started, and it has been among the areas hardest hit by the epidemic, with almost 500 infections and 12 deaths.
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