Ajit Karn
Beijing: Wednesday, his family verified that the doctor who exposed China’s cover-up of the SARS epidemic in 2003 has passed away at the age of 91.
Jiang Yanyong, who was a doctor at a Beijing military hospital at the time, angered authorities when he informed foreign media of China’s attempts to minimise the severity of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome outbreak, disclosing the existence of hundreds of previously concealed cases.
His funeral was conducted on Wednesday morning, according to Jiang’s daughter-in-law Cui Hong, who told AFP she was “not permitted” to attend and refused to provide any additional information about his demise. He apparently passed away on Saturday.
More than 800 people died worldwide as a result of SARS, and the Chinese government was harshly criticised internationally for initially concealing the fact that the disease originated in southern China.
After publicly condemning the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, during which the military suppressed weeks of student-led democracy protests and possibly killed hundreds or thousands, Jiang was placed under house arrest for eight months.
In 2004, Jiang, a member of the Chinese Communist Party, requested an official reevaluation of the incident in a letter to then-prime minister Wen Jiabao.
In 2007, the whistleblower was prohibited from travelling to the United States in order to receive a human rights award, among other restrictions.
Jiang’s demise was not covered by mainland China’s censored media, but a few social media users paid tribute on the popular Weibo platform.
A Weibo user remarked, “He was a courageous physician who spoke the truth.”
In China’s authoritarian government, information about natural disasters and public health crises is still strictly regulated.
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In December 2019, Wuhan police reprimanded a group of physicians for disseminating “rumours” after they warned on social media about the spread of Covid-19, a disease similar to SARS, throughout the central Chinese city.
The death of ophthalmologist Li Wenliang, one of the physicians dispatched by police, from Covid sparked a wave of public outrage.
