Online cries for help in a Chinese city under coronavirus siege
- Relatives of people infected in Wuhan are resorting to the internet to try to get hospital care for their family members
- From WeChat groups to city hotlines, desperate children seek help for their parents
Some patients and their relatives are so desperate that they have turned to social media in the hope that their cases will attract the attention of the authorities.
On Sina Weibo, one of the dominant social media platforms in China, the topic “pneumonia patients asking for help” had more than 1,608 posts, 1.38 billion views and 487,000 followers.
On Monday, a 30-year-old woman tagged the topic to a post in which she pleaded for help for her father, who had attempted suicide after contracting the illness.
The woman, who identified herself only as Zhang, said her father developed a fever on January 26 and was told that he had a lung infection on February 1.
Zhang said she tried everything to find a bed for her father – calling local communities, health bureaus, hospital fever wards and the mayor’s hotline – all to no avail.
On February 5, her father attempted suicide, she said.
“My dad could not bear it, so he cut his wrist that evening, but he was saved by my mum,” she said, adding that her father had multiple health problems, including high blood pressure, heart disease and Parkinson’s disease.
