Chinese authorities have begun emergency requisitioning of private hospitals, hotels, apartments, cars and even face masks as the country’s rising number of coronavirus patients threatens to overwhelm local government facilities.
But the measures, particularly the requisitioning of hospitals, have left some people with other life-threatening diseases without critical care, creating what one relative of a cancer patient affected by the seizures described as a “humanitarian” disaster.
China’s southern industrial hub of Guangzhou this week joined a host of other big city governments such as Zhengzhou, Fuzhou and Xi’an in passing emergency legislation for requisitioning.