The New York Times announced that the doctor who was first to sound the alarm on the dreaded Wuhan coronavirus passed away last Friday, February 7, felled by the same disease he tried to warn people about in December 2019.
As China has finally admitted to its “shortcomings” in the early days of containing 2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease or ARD, Chinese people are growing increasingly critical and angry at officials, even in the face of crackdowns on any criticism of the government’s response to the virus.
Dr. Li Wenliang, the 34-year-old ophtalmologist and father of one-and-a-half (as his wife was pregnant at the time of his death), was the first to notice that an upsurge of people with SARS-like symptoms were arriving at the hospital where he worked. He sounded a call about the symptoms to a chat group with fellow doctors on December 30-which earned him a slew of sanctions from the Chinese government, starting with a reprimand in the middle of the night.
Bowing from what could have been nothing but fear, intimidation, and harassment from the Chinese investigators and police, he retracted his “warning” and he was forced to admit to “illegal behavior.”
He, along with eight other colleagues were reprimanded for speaking to other doctors on the then-mysterious illness.
Contracted the disease while working
Even as he was vilified by authorities, Dr. Wenliang went back to work. While he was treating a patient for glaucoma, though, he contracted 2019-nCoV ARD.
When thousands of Wuhan residents became ill with the virus, the government was forced to admit that they had failed in the initial days of what was already an outbreak that would cripple the world’s second-largest economy.
China now has little choice but to express regret at the doctor’s passing, even as it admitted to sanctioning him just a month before. Officials from the local Wuhan mayor to Beijing have expressed their condolences and heaped praises on the doctor–just as Chinese citizens process the complex emotions associated with the doctor’s death.
What’s more, the doctor’s death puts China’s lack of transparency with regards to health worker infections, and how a doctor of only 34 passed away from the disease, when the alleged median age for infected is 49 to 56 years old.
Chinese public mourns his death deeply, galvanizing anger against Chinese authorities
As unofficial reports of Dr. Wenliang’s deteriorating condition emerged on February 6, Chinese social media lit up with sentiment. Users called on others to pray and support the doctor that he would rally through.
Official word of his death came from Wuhan City Central Hospital on Friday, even as some unofficial reports also announced his passing hours earlier.
“We will not forget the doctor who spoke up about an illness that was called rumor,” one commenter posted in reply to the hospital’s announcement. “What else can we do? The only thing is not to forget.”
A photo on Twitter also showed “Farewell to Dr. Wenliang” written in Chinese in the snow on a riverbank.
In reference to the content of the letter that Dr. Wenliang was forced to sign to retract his warnings, Chinese posts have started using, “Can you manage, do you understand?”
Rest in peace, Dr. Li Wenliang. Thank you for trying to warn us.
