Last year, Zhu Tongyu, a member of the country's top political advisory body, proposed building a strategic medical emergency center in the Yangtze River Delta.

During this year's two sessions－the annual meetings of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, and the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the top advisory body－Zhu upgraded his previous proposal to include the building of 10 such centers in megacities across China, each with a capacity of 3,000 to 5,000 beds and a reserve of critical medical supplies.

Zhu is director of the Shanghai Public Health Center, the only hospital designated to treat COVID-19 patients in the city, as well as a member of the 13th CPPCC National Committee.

"It's like a bastion to defend our biological security," he said, adding that with centers like the one in Shanghai, the government can respond faster when an epidemic like COVID-19 breaks out. "But what we have is far from enough."

The Shanghai center, in the city's suburban Jinshan district, has only 660 beds and 250 doctors, which Zhu said is insufficient for large outbreaks of contagious diseases.

"China is such a big country that it will inevitably be hit by epidemics, and we should not fight a war without advance preparation," he said.

Zhu wants these strategic centers to be similar to the Shanghai center but larger, with 1,500 beds during regular operation and 3,500 lots underground that can be used for parking in normal times but can also be converted to space for medical beds in three days.

Source: China Daily