There is no Emergency in Chinese Medicine

First let me start this blog with three stories.

Soon after we moved here, one of Kenny’s friends happened upon a scooter accident. The man was lying on the ground convulsing.   She moved to help the man and was physically held back by the spectators.  She yelled in Chinese, I’m an American Doctor.  Still they wouldn't let her through to help the man.  She told me. "All I wanted to do was hold his head so that it wouldn't hit the concrete."

My neighbor and her 5 year old son, went to a Mall near our house.  Just outside the Mall she saw a women jump to her death from about the 5^th floor.  She shielded her son from seeing this.  A group of spectators formed.  No one checked to see if the woman was alive.  My friend asked her driver to call for an ambulance.  The ambulance came 25 minutes later.  The spectators were still there.  The dead woman was still holding her purse. No one had even moved to cover her.

Duane, my husband, works in the downtown area.  He often walks around at lunch time. One day he saw a taxi hit a man on a scooter. The scooter driver landed on his head.  Duane has been instructed to not get involved with any accidents despite that fact that he was an EMT in the states for years.   Again it took 25 minutes for the ambulance to get there.  Each ambulance carries a nurse and doctor.  The doctor got out checked the scooter drivers pulse,  decided he was dead,  went back to the vehicle and let the driver and nurse pick up the dead man and put him in the ambulance.  Duane suffered for weeks because he was unable/not allowed to help the accident victim.  He is hardwired to help.

There are so many words to describe these situations:  heartless, archaic, and inconceivable.  How could people stand around like that and do nothing??  Even if I knew nothing about medicine, I could hold someone’s hand, cover them with a coat, or call their family – if the person was conscious.  In summary, demonstrate compassion.

So why isn’t that happening in China? First, no one has a right to emergency medicine.  When you get to the emergency room, you will not be treated without someone paying the 3000-4000 rmb fee first ($600-800).  Helping someone on the street can make you responsible for this fee.  I haven’t been able to confirm that there is a good Samaritan law here so getting involved makes you responsible.  Unbelievable, the person you helped could come after you for money for their “recovery”.   Your act of good will may come back to haunt you.

Second, there is no first aid or EMT training here. The education in China is very narrow.  You never learn to do more than just your one job.  The majority of citizens young and old wouldn’t have a clue what to do. And may do more harm than good.  Think early 20^th Century America.

Next is the Chinese concept of Guanxi.  You only care about your family and you only help your friends who can in return help you.  Everyone else is a non-entity. This is also related to the over population and competition. In a country with serious competition for resources from education to good jobs, one less person may be a good thing.  China has had recent famines (1950-60) and the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) which turned family members against one another. Both affected the altruism of the people living in China today.

In the case of the suicide, there are numerous social pressures involved.  Approximately 300,000 people commit suicide each year here. Although you can imagine how difficult it is to get reliable statistics on something like this.  The ratio is 3:1, female to male.   In China the family is still responsible for taking care of the elderly.  Therefore every Chinese parent is personally invested in seeing his one and only daughter or son marry well and get a good job.  The parents’ future depends on that money. 

Sheng nu is the term for any unmarried women over the age of 27.  It means Leftover.  This is a term recognized by the government and carries serious social stigma.  Thus unmarried status is enough to cause depression and suicide.  One of China’s “unmentionable” topics is divorce.  There are 10,000 divorces each day in China.  About 20% of the marriages fail with in the first 3 years.   Thus, young women in their 30’s have yet another reason to be depressed and seek suicide as an option.

In another context, consider these human qualities as they relate to the Chinese military.  A country where people don’t care about others (in a general sense) and have no personal history of helping anyone outside their family.  The Chinese military may be large in number but it is untested. Now it is made up of young people who are single children. Will today’s young soldiers run away rather than protect?  Or stand and spectate as a fellow solider dies? 

The next time someone rants about a lack of values in America, think again. We have far more compassion than we think.