Officials must stay dedicated to duty in virus fight

On Tuesday night a video went viral online showing how some local community staff in Wuhan performed in sending severe novel coronavirus patients to hospital.

According to the video, the bus driver recruited to transport the patients was led to several places before his intended destination. Then when he collected all over 30 patients, they were led by community staff on a complicated route to the hospital, during which the wait was so long some patients complained. At last, when they reached their destination, no one was there to receive them and the patients had to wait 40 minutes before the driver found the registration area.

During the whole process, it was the driver handling them alone, without any community staff helping him. All the staff did was sit in another car and "lead the way" for the bus.

Is such chaos and low efficiency what we can depend on to fight the epidemic? Is it proper for them to treat severe patients in this way? Is it the local community staff’s style to "lead the way" without ever talking to patients who need help?

No. Community staff are State employees, too, and their bad performance reflects on higher authorities as directors. No one can exclude the possibility of similar problems in other communities that happened without being recorded by a camera. That’s why the central directing group to Hubei province summoned three officials of Wuhan city, including a vice-mayor. In order to solve the problem of those who execute the plan, it is necessary to regulate higher levels of officials.

According to reports, the group requires the local government of Wuchang District, where the incident happened, and the street governance staff to apologize to each of the patients, and those responsible will be held to account. That’s exactly right. Each patient is an individual person with dignity, and each deserves an apology from officials who failed their duties, just as each official who has committed wrongdoing deserves strict penalties.

As of Tuesday, the number of newly infected patients nationwide outside Hubei province had dropped for seven consecutive days, which is good news. However, the turning point has not yet arrived, according to leading experts. It is fair to say we are now at a critical point in fighting the epidemic, and whether we can control it sooner will depend upon our joint efforts.

I hope the incident sends a warning to all officials — it is time to do their jobs better for the common good of all.