At least 29 people died in China in the fire of a hospital in Beijing, authorities announced on Wednesday the day after this disaster, the deadliest in the Chinese capital since 2002. This new assessment was communicated during a press conference by Li Zongrong, deputy mayor of Fengtai district where the hospital is located, who offered his “sincere condolences”.
The municipal police, for its part, announced the arrest of 12 people, including the director of the hospital and employees of the company in charge of renovation work in the building.
Wednesday morning, a strong police presence was still visible around the establishment, trying to discourage groups of passers-by who observe and film with their phones, AFP journalists noted. The main entrance to the building appeared mostly intact from the outside, but images of the interior published by business media Caixin show completely charred beds and blackened walls.
“It’s a hospital that had a pretty good reputation”
On a facade of the hospital complex, we can see windows and walls browned by soot, as well as a broken window. “We have no hospitalized relatives or loved ones affected by the fire, we just come to see the situation,” said a 50-year-old man who did not wish to give his name. “In the history of Beijing, this is the biggest tragedy in a hospital, I think. I wonder what could have caused this fire, ”wonders another, also in his fifties. “It’s a hospital that had a pretty good reputation,” he added.
The alert of a fire outbreak at Changfeng Hospital in Fengtai District was given shortly before 1 p.m. (5 a.m. GMT) on Tuesday. The disaster could be extinguished half an hour later, while rescuers evacuated 71 patients within two hours, according to the official Beijing Daily newspaper.
A previous report, this Wednesday morning, mentioned 21 dead. No details were given on the condition or number of those injured in the fire. This fire is the deadliest in the Chinese capital since the one that occurred in June 2002 in an internet cafe, which killed 25 students.
Images of people seeking protection from the flames sitting on outdoor air conditioning units, or clinging to sheets before jumping from the building that houses the hospital have been shared on social media. “The number one priority is treating the injured,” said Yin Li, Communist Party secretary in Beijing, who visited the scene, according to the Beijing Daily.
He recommended “setting up a task force at the municipal level”, in particular to “quickly identify the cause of the accident and hold accountable those responsible, in accordance with the law”.
Several families of patients said they had lost contact with their loved ones, with the missing patients being mainly elderly people who have difficulty moving around, the Chinese Youth Daily, an official newspaper, said on Wednesday.
“So many people died”
Changfeng Hospital is located in western Beijing, about a 25-minute drive from Tiananmen Square.
On the Chinese social network Weibo, Internet users complained on Wednesday about the online censorship quickly applied around this drama. “So many people died. This is a major security incident and oddly not as popular as one celebrity insulting another,” one noted. “They are doing a good job of removing (this information) from the most searched terms” on the social network, quipped another.
Fatal fires are quite common in China, due to poor safety standards and corruption among officials responsible for enforcing them. But they are relatively rare in Beijing.
In November 2022, 10 people were killed in the fire of a residential building in Urumqi, the regional capital of Xinjiang (northwest), triggering a movement of popular anger against the anti-Covid health restrictions, accused of having hampered the work of the emergency services. Also in November, 38 people died in a factory fire in Anyang (central), authorities accusing employees of mishandling.
