Volunteers assist in efforts against coronavirus

Members of the China National Democratic Construction Association's Shanghai Committee have been among the first to respond to the nationwide campaign against novel coronavirus.

On Chinese New Year's Eve, a message in the association's chat group sparked discussion among its members from all over the country.

According to the message, the China Siyuan Foundation for Poverty Alleviation wanted buy 1 million masks and some other things. It called on members whose companies produce such items to provide information.

Shanghai Committee members forwarded the messages hundreds of times.

Zhou Liyuan, 42, a psychologist and author, is counseling those under great mental pressure in Wuhan, both medics and the public.

"There were some video clips about medics' hard work in Wuhan on Chinese New Year's Eve and several of them were overwhelmed by the stress and showed signs of emotional breakdown. I wondered if I could do anything for them," Zhou told Shanghai Daily. "On the same day, I received two invitations from a workshop in Wuhan and an online counseling platform so joined their volunteer team."

In the workshop, she answered calls four to five fours each day.

"I believe we give support the medics and patients. Some medics suffered serious emotional breakdowns during the early days of the outbreak and they had nowhere to share their worries," said Zhou.

"Similarly, the patients in quarantine live in great fear. They worry about their health and feel angry and powerless."

Zhou said the most important thing to do is to alleviate feeling of isolation and listen to the person.

Crisis intervention is much more than general counseling. "For crisis intervention, the most important thing is to remain stable and not let the person's emotional state and reason affect each other."

On the contrary, the traditional psychological counseling often need the consultant to arouse the patients' emotions as much as possible .

"When something unpleasant happens, we should keep the person calm and relieve his or her negative emotion. We should 'accompany' them rather than help them," Zhou said.

Committee member Cao Dongmei, deputy general manager of Shanghai Chengdong Sanitation Service Co, and the other executives organized and joined in with street cleaning.

"It's kind of tradition for our company to do volunteer work during Spring Festival . But this one is special," said Cao. "We noticed the risk of epidemic before the holiday and added more people to each position. Residential communities all showed great gratitude."

Cao asked the workers to do the temperature screening first before being on duty and bought new temperature screening facilities.

"Our workers, especially migrant workers, all missed their families but still decided to stay. So we raised our employee benefits," she said.

"But no matter what happens, we will fight until the end of the battle against the epidemic."

Ti Gong