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 They had returned early from the Lunar New Year holiday to go back
to work at Tongji hospital, just five kilometers away, but laden
with luggage and food from concerned relatives, they had no way to
reach there.
Seeing their request for help online, 53-year-old Wuhan resident
Chen Hui donned a face mask and went to pick them up at the station,
which is just down the street from the seafood market believed to be
where the coronavirus emerged.
Wuhan, where 11 million people live, has been paralyzed by
containment efforts by health authorities. With public transit shut
down and taxis and ride-hailing operations also suspended, ordinary
citizens are risking their health to ferry medical staff to and from
work and getting key supplies such as food and masks to people
needed to keep the city running.
"Through the experience of this epidemic, I really feel that we
people of Wuhan are so united. Everyone in our group has such a
strong sense of mission," said Chen, who runs an ad hoc ride service
through a messaging group on China's ubiquitous WeChat app, to find
volunteer drivers for people working in vital roles, like doctors
and health workers.
Long days are common for the volunteers, some of whom are lending a
hand from outside Wuhan. Shen Honghua, a volunteer who lives in
eastern Zhejiang province, sits with two phones and her computer
every day to find hotel rooms for some of the thousands of medical
workers arriving in Wuhan.
"I wouldn't sleep until 3 a.m. or 4 a.m.," she said.
While no-one has tallied the number of rides given or donations
sent, one informal alliance of hoteliers who volunteered their rooms
estimated that in the first week of the shutdown, hotels in Wuhan
sheltered over 6,000 medical workers.
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The work is not without risk or consequence. Many volunteers in the
city use pseudonyms and keep their work hidden from their families
who may otherwise try to stop them. Some have also fallen ill after
being exposed to the virus during their work. Officials in Wuhan and
Hubei province have repeatedly warned of shortages in medical
equipment to guard against infection including masks, even as
Beijing exhorts manufacturers to boost production.
One 50-year-old volunteer, who has not told his family what he is
doing and declined to give his real name, said he wore a mask
purchased from a grocery store when he started ferrying doctors and
nurses to and from work.
"After they got in the car, they said what you're wearing is
completely below standard," he recalled from one of his first rides.
He now delivers donations of food, medical supplies and protective
gear to other volunteers as well as people whose family members have
fallen ill from the new virus.
Chen's family found out about her volunteer work when her daughter
called one day during a delivery run. Hearing the noise in the
background, her daughter suspected that she was outside and pressed
for the truth, asking for a video call. Chen said she had no choice
but to tell the truth.
"She said to me, 'I'm asking, are you going out tomorrow? If you go
out tomorrow, then I'm not going to wear a face mask. I'm going to
stand outside the gate to my building and let myself get infected.'"
"If you get infected, then how can I live?"
(Editing by Se Young Lee & Simon Cameron-Moore)
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