At a meeting of the leading group on novel coronavirus prevention and control on Feb 20, Premier Li Keqiang, head of the group, urged further efforts on protection for medics and wider application of clinical effective drugs and emphasized the necessity of speeding up orderly resumption of work and production.
Premier Li also is a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee.
Wang Huning, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and deputy head of the group, also attended the meeting.
The whole nation should further implement President Xi Jinping’s important speeches and instructions, and act according to the group’s deployment, paying high attention to keeping medics safe and ensuring medical supplies in every aspect. Clinical effective drugs should be widely used to save infected patients, and orderly work and production resumption should be speeded up amid epidemic prevention and control, according to the meeting.
Medics are the main strength of China’s fight against the epidemic, but some have been infected, especially in Hubei province, and mostly before Feb 1. They should be treated with an all-out effort, and no new infection among medics is allowed.
Improving front-line medics’ work environment and caring for their mental and physical health was stressed. Training on protection technology must be given, while there should never be shortages of medical supplies, especially for key positions and key medical staff. Medics who have been spending a long time at the front line should take turns having days off, and their wages, allowances, and subsidies should be well ensured with compassionate care for them and their families.
The meeting said effective treatment should be further enhanced while doing the utmost to control infection sources and cut transmission routes. Drug screening and application have been gaining progress, and wider application of effective drugs should be encouraged by organizing pharmaceutical-producing enterprises to speed up production.
Incentives should be made to guide recovered patients to donate plasma to popularize clinically-effective plasma treatment, the meeting said. Doing so means the death rate of critical patients can be lowered and more patients with mild symptoms can be prevented from deteriorating into critical condition.
Guidelines on epidemic prevention and control for work and production resumption were discussed.
The monitoring of employers’ health conditions and individual protection should be strengthened, with measures taken to ensure safety in workplaces, canteens and dormitories, with group activities reduced and quick responses made if anything unusual happens, according to the meeting.
Local authorities were required to coordinate epidemic prevention and control with economic and social development, and to advance business resumption in an orderly way, especially in the spring agricultural production, and in the industry, transportation and logistics sectors, and major projects.
The mechanism for joint prevention and control of the State Council should better coordinate and dispatch necessities to Hubei province, and related departments should ensure smooth logistic channels, the meeting said.
Also, Hubei province and Wuhan city should receive and distribute necessities, and produce vegetables in available areas.
Ding Xuexiang, Huang Kunming, Cai Qi, Xiao Jie and Zhao Kezhi, members of the leading group, also attended the meeting.
