4. Ensuring the supply of medical resources
In order to alleviate the shortage of medical resources in Hubei, there
has been 380 medical teams comprising of more than 42,000 doctors,
nurses, infection control practitioners and public health experts from
all over China to provide their help in Wuhan as of February 25. What’s
more, each province has been paired with one prefecture-level city of
Hubei other than Wuhan to deliver medical aid and vital personal
protective equipment to the people of the whole province. In addition,
with the help of telemedicine and artificial intelligence, hundreds of
thousands of doctors across the country have been conducting online
consultations, greatly easing the pressure on the overall Chinese and
Wuhan healthcare system and effectively reducing the number of walk-in
patients and thus their risks of infection exposure.
On the other hand, the Leishenshan Hospital and Huoshenshan Hospital,
Wuhan versions of Beijing Xiaotangshan Hospital in the fight against
SARS in 2003, were established in Wuhan, the design and construction of
which was completed in 12 days and 9 days respectively, providing more
than 14,000 isolation beds. Another 30,000 beds for mild patients were
also managed in mobile cabin hospitals that were remodeled day and
night. Moreover, to deal with potential increasing patient volume in
other provinces, hospitals for fever patients were designated and
regular wards were transformed into isolation wards. In addition to
covering all the individual cost of treatment, the government also fully
supports the acceleration of basic research and clinical trials of
COVID-19, and its vaccine development.