Plague

A man wearing a face mask walks along a road in Beijing on 11 March 2020. (Wang Zhao/AFP)
Culture

Powerless, helpless and downtrodden: The state of Chinese literature in this pandemic

By Yan Lianke 23 Mar 2020
In today’s age where it seems that all great literature has been written, Yan Lianke has a modest wish for aspiring writers in China. He hopes that they will have the space to create works, unfettered by thoughts of going against the grain. He believes that creating a culture that allows for dissenting voices in literature is far more important and desperately needed than creating a single or a few accidental great literary works.
Medical staff prepare to transfer Covid-19 patients from Wuhan No.5 Hospital to Leishenshan Hospital in Wuhan, March 2020. The people of Wuhan are grateful to front line healthcare workers and volunteers. (AFP)
Society

Official's call for city of Wuhan to express gratitude backfires

By Yu Zeyuan 09 Mar 2020
Angry netizens suggest that Wuhan party secretary Wang Zhonglin’s call for gratitude for the CCP shows where officials’ allegiance truly lies. The testy mood of the public portends the zero tolerance of further grandstanding behaviour.
The plague outbreak in late 1910 spread with the use of railways. There were many cases and deaths in northeast China, and the Qing dynasty government pumped in plenty of medical resources. In this photo, medical staff gather in front of an inn. At the time, there were many confirmed and suspected cases, and there was a serious lack of medical spaces, leading to the use of inns as medical facilities.
History

[Photo story] The Manchurian plague outbreak and the Malayan doctor Wu Lien-teh

By Hsu Chung-mao 18 Feb 2020
The current coronavirus outbreak is not the first epidemic in China. Photo collector and Taiwanese writer Hsu Chung-mao, looks at a plague outbreak in Manchuria over a century ago and the role played by a Malaya-born doctor and Nobel Prize nominee.