Family Of Dead Patient Rampages Through China Hospital; Wounds Six

BEIJING — Relatives of a patient who died rampaged with knives through a Chinese hospital, seriously wounding six people and trying to throw a doctor out a window in the city of Shanghai, news reports said Tuesday.

The 20 relatives of the patient, identified as Liu Yonghua, stormed through Xinhua Hospital's thoracic surgery department after Liu died Monday, according to website Eastnet and broadcaster Dragon TV.

The family members tried to throw the department's deputy director out an eighth-floor window, but other employees stopped them, Eastnet said. It said one person suffered a stab wound that came within half an inch (1.5 centimeters) of his heart.

Police detained six people, Eastnet said.

Dragon TV showed a wounded physician in a hospital bed being treated for his wounds.

The reports gave no details of Liu's illness or cause of death or why his relatives might be angry at hospital workers.

Employees who answered the phone at the hospital's public information department confirmed the attack occurred but did not immediately release details.

Chinese hospitals have suffered a series of attacks in recent years by distraught patients or their relatives. Some are triggered by demands for compensation after a death or complaints of overcharging or fake treatment.

Comments

[JeanRR]

08:04 AM on 02/03/2011

But if they had had guns, we would be reading a body count statistic.

[blue53]

04:08 PM on 02/02/2011

"Some are triggered by demands for compensation after a death or complaints of overcharging or fake treatment."


So how does your malpractice insurance payment look now, Docs?

[Benjamin Rosenfeld]

02:05 PM on 02/02/2011

A half an inch is actually 1.27 centimeters.

[dvsinla]

01:59 PM on 02/02/2011

only if the doctors and nurses and orderlies and candy stripers all had big semi automatic guns.... none of this would have happened

[William K]

03:37 PM on 02/02/2011

I like sarcasm! Fanned and faved.

[lightningbolt]

12:45 PM on 02/02/2011

This will happen very soon at your nearest health insurance company  headquarters if they continue dropping coverage for patients with pre-existing conditions and they die as a result.

[oceanye]

05:21 AM on 02/02/2011

I'm very tired of Huffpost repression of truth.

[oceanye]

05:11 AM on 02/02/2011

" complaints of overcharging or fake treatment" ? So U. S. medical greed practice has 'trickled down' to Chinese hospitals and Chinese doctors, has it??

[satanlite]

12:27 PM on 02/02/2011

I'd say so. They look at the success of our fraudulent economic models and are getting envious. Healthcare for profit - whadda scheme!

[shanghaislim]

12:37 AM on 02/02/2011

Emotions run high in these situations, any where in the world.

In China, with family members abound, they do not have the same respect for authority...i.e. doctors, local police, etc. and apparently became a mob fueled by misinformation and emotion.

This type of chaotic scene plays out 100 times a day in Shanghai for even the slightest traffic accident or argument.

I witnessed a mob charge the gate at a top International Airport over a delayed flight.

It is a way of life in China..........this one (the extreme rarity) turned dangerously violent)

[jessicajuliette]

12:58 PM on 02/02/2011

"It is a way of life."

So if i mistakenly give someone paper instead of plastic I'm going out the window?

Harsh.

[akcoins]

04:29 PM on 02/02/2011

So the tea party has taken hold in China too!

[Freesia2]

12:44 AM on 02/03/2011

lol

[1donewrong]

07:45 PM on 02/01/2011

Time for knife control

[OneEarthling]

06:41 PM on 02/01/2011

Tort reform in practice.

[R Davis]

06:13 PM on 02/01/2011

I thought they'd achieved the communist ideal. Why'd they give up the clinics that was established during the revolution?

[HuffDave13]

06:41 PM on 02/01/2011

And we have reached the capitalist ideal

[life-of-riley]

06:48 AM on 02/02/2011

They've got that one also.

[HarpoSnarx]

03:48 PM on 02/01/2011

Just wait til the Second Amendment hits our fiscal overlords.

[climbing panda]

03:30 PM on 02/01/2011

it's like chushingura.

[LeftLeanWing]

07:51 AM on 02/02/2011

Chūshingura (忠臣蔵) is the name for fictionalized accounts of the historical revenge by the Forty-seven Ronin of the death of their master, Asano Naganori. .

[climbing panda]

01:17 PM on 02/02/2011

which would be why i used the reference

[m1jones]

02:30 PM on 02/01/2011

Wow. It's hard to obtain good health care in China. You have to pay for it privately. China has closed its government health care, which was so successful during the cultural revolution. It consisted of neighborhood healthcare clinics, with more serious patients being referred to hospitals - all of it government run.

Now, Chinese hospitals may require payment up front for surgery. If these relatives had scraped together the money for their relative to have surgery, they may have felt cheated when he died, even if the cause of death was not the fault of the hospital or the doctor.

Much of China's economic progress has been at the expense of its the social care systems it once maintained, such as care for the elderly. Even families don't want to care for elderly people today. They really just need to die or keep working.

I think people in America don't realize just how much China follows the capitalist system. China supported even more unfettered capitalism than America, where capitalism is a bit constrained by environmental laws and health concerns. (For example, their toys and dishes, and even building materials, have lead in them because no one cares if workers get lead poisoning).

The secretive Chinese Government is more like the Board of Directors of a Corporation than an elected more democratic government. Most Chinese prefer it that way. Most Chinese I know think democracy would be a disaster in China because there is such a disparity of cultures and beliefs.

[Frog in a pot]

02:56 PM on 02/01/2011

China is an american corporation with a Chinese flag.What did you think the China deal was about ...freedom?

[CHMB]

03:26 PM on 02/01/2011

I wasn't aware of how health care was run in China. Thank you for the post.

Fanned.

[jwald1]

07:48 PM on 02/01/2011

ditto

[NonConforming]

02:08 PM on 02/01/2011

Good old govt run hospital

[deluk]

02:20 PM on 02/01/2011

"complaints about overcharging"?

[Ramon Moreno]

02:26 PM on 02/01/2011

nice try, tro||