Virus-hit city makes all efforts to fight against novel coronavirus epidemic
By He Guanghua, Hou Linliang,
People’s Daily
Xiantao in central China’s Hubei Province
has played its part in the nationwide battle against the novel coronavirus
epidemic through curbing the virus and producing medical materials in full
swing.
Xiantao is known as China’s
famous industrial city of nonwovens as it abounds with non-woven fabrics. The
city is also a member of the Wuhan City Circle, a regional economic union with
Wuhan, the epicenter of the novel coronavirus epidemic, being the center.
On Feb. 8, Xiantao, the
county-level city managed to increase its daily output of medical protective
clothing to 30,000, a figure that seemed impossible in the past.
Although it abounds with
non-woven fabrics, Xiantao has very few manufacturers that can handle the whole
process of production of medical protective clothing. Some local companies can
only provide raw materials or semi-finished products.
At present, the whole country,
especially Wuhan, is face with a shortage in medical supplies. “We are going to
fulfill the task whether we have the conditions or not. There’s no turning back
but only mission and responsibility for us in front of the epidemic,” said Zhou
Zhihong, secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Xiantao municipal
committee, after receiving the order from the provincial government of Hubei.
In an effort to improve
production capacity, Xiantao has spared no effort to mobilize the whole city
and make scientific arrangements to speed up production of relevant supplies
and make full use of every minute.
The city has ensured overall
coordination and unified procurement of equipment, unified supply of raw
materials, unified protection and accommodation for employees, unified
inspection, test and quarantine, unified loading and transportation, and
unified budgetary appropriations for designated enterprises.
Meanwhile, the city has launched
dedicated work teams to guarantee production of relevant supplies. Each team
has been stationed in one local factory to organize production on site.
According to Yan Zhichao, deputy
mayor of Xiantao, a total of ten local enterprises have been involved in the
production of medical protective clothing, with one of which providing raw
materials and the other nine producing semi-finished products. All of the
products were handed over to Winner Medical Group Inc., a provider of medical
supplies headquartered in Shenzhen, south China’s Guangdong Province, to go
through procedures such as disinfection.
Production standards of medical
protective clothing are extremely strict, especially those concerning joining
two pieces of cloth together with a strip, according to Jiang Aiping, a quality
inspector, explaining that only by sticking strips on relevant areas can the
cloth be joined together and the effect of the clothing be strengthened.
“It looks simply, but skilled
workers are not easy to find,” said Jiang, while demonstrating the process of
pasting strips.
“It’s difficult to recruit
workers during the Spring Festival holiday, and it’s even more difficult to
find workers to stick the strips,” added Sun Aimin, a staff member who stood
nearby.
On Jan. 24, the eve of the Spring
Festival, Xiantao started to mobilize resources for the production of medical
protective clothing across the city. After a comprehensive survey, it was found
out that there were only 70 skilled workers who can stick the strips on medical
protective clothing and only 40 machines for the job.
A skilled worker can only handle
the strips of up to 200 medical protective clothes a day even at full capacity,
a speed which is too slow for achieving the goal of a daily output of 30,000.
Under such circumstances, Hu
Changwei, secretary of the Party committee of Pengchang town, Xiantao, who has
been stationed in a local company for the production of medical protective
clothing, braced himself to create conditions to achieve the production target.
Hu asked manufacturers of
relevant equipment about information of the buyers, and then looked for skilled
workers in relevant cities to stick strips on medical protective clothing. He
called these workers, offering them three times the pay and inviting them to
work in Xiantao.
Hu sent cars to pick up workers
in other provinces, and finally invited more than 150 workers from provinces
including central China’s Hunan Province, east China’s Jiangxi Province, and
central China’s Henan Province.
At the same time, Hu organized
training for over 200 local workers, and purchased more than 190 machines for
sticking strips from cities including Jiangmen, Guangdong Province, through
efforts of multiple parties.
Medical protective clothes are
armors for medical workers. From cloth to finished products, each piece of
these clothes involves as many as 20 manufacturing procedures. Every procedure
must be carried out with special care, for even the slightest carelessness
would ruin the clothes.
Winner Medical Group has sent
more than 20 quality inspectors to Xiantao. Quality inspectors usually don’t
drink much water, so as not to waste time by going to the toilet, disclosed
Feng Dan, a quality inspector.
“Even a gap as small as a needle
eye is not acceptable,” stressed Feng, who pays close attention to every piece
of clothes in her hands.
With amazing sense of
responsibility and unrelenting efforts, Xiantao created marvelous results.
Since the city resumed production on Jan. 24, the eve of Spring Festival, it
increased the daily production of protective clothing to 7,000 pieces on Jan.
29, to 15,000 by Feb.10 and to 30,000 on Feb. 8.
“At the thought of the doctors
and nurses trying all out to save lives in ICUs, we know we must rise to the
difficulties in production and provide armors for them, so that we can defeat
the epidemic at an early date,” said Zhou, who disclosed that the biggest
challenge for Xiantao is the current traffic restrictions for vehicles, as the
city has to purchase raw materials from other provinces.
Photo taken on Feb. 8 shows
workers busy with production of medical protective supplies in a workshop of a
local company in Xiantao, central China’s Hubei Province. (Hou Linliang/People’s
Daily)
Virus-hit city makes all efforts to fight against novel coronavirus epidemic
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