Judicial administrators in Wuhan contribute greatly to war on COVID-19

In the seventh pilot edition of the COVID-19 diagnosis and treatment guidelines released by China's top health authority in early March, a sentence depicting the pathological changes caused by the disease played a significant role in clinical treatment and determination of patients' cause of death: "Most of the damage is done to patients' lungs and immune system; most of the damage to other visceral organs is secondary and varies based on patients' underlying medical conditions."

Behind the sentence are the relentless efforts of a team of legal medical experts led by Liu Liang, head of the forensic service association of Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei province.

In less than 10 days after Feb 16, the team completed systemic autopsies of up to nine patients who had died from the disease and compiled the world's first comprehensive report on its effects.

The work of Liu's team offers a glimpse of the comprehensive effort made by the city's judicial administrators in various fields in the battle against the epidemic.

Legislative support

On Jan 28, less than a week after the lockdown of Wuhan, the city's judicial bureau received an urgent task requiring it to immediately begin the development of interim measures for COVID-19 epidemic prevention and control.

The bureau embarked on the legislation project the same day by setting up a taskforce to thoroughly study the existing provisions for emergency response, infectious disease prevention and control as well as public health emergency response and complete an initial draft of the measures overnight.

The next day, after convening two meetings to discuss and revise the draft article by article, the bureau submitted it to the municipal government which officially enforced the measures in the wee hours of Jan 30, less than two days after the project began.

Premium legal services

To meet the public demand for high-quality legal services during the epidemic, the bureau upgraded its online public legal service platform to provide the public with free legal services such as legal consultation, notarization and legal information about epidemic prevention and control.

"A professional legal service team made up of 100 lawyers, notaries, forensic experts, full-time legal aid lawyers and people's mediators have been offering legal advice to the public 24 hours a day," said Tian Jianchun, head of the bureau's public legal service division.

In addition, seven local public notary offices have also been drawing on the platform to provide online notarization of 42 matters for the public.

In one case, a large local enterprise which planned to bid for a dredging project at a port in Bangladesh turned to a public notary office for the notarization of a stack of materials needed for the bidding. "Time is very tight," a staffer of the enterprise told Zhou Xun, a notary at the office, in a phone call.

Quickly and in an orderly way, Zhou wrapped up the full notarization process in just one and a half days, presenting the enterprise all the needed documents in time.

Since its upgrade, the platform has gained over 400 subscribers and nearly 1,200 views.

Dispute mediation

Party members of the judicial bureau of Jiangxi district have been acting as people's mediators since the epidemic, dedicated to maintaining harmony in communities.

"It is more difficult to mediate disputes during the epidemic than in normal times," said Kang Bo, a mediator at the bureau. "In a relatively isolated environment, many of the disputes were caused by insignificant trivialities." Kang has resolved over 30 disputes since the outbreak.

As with Kang, police officers in Wuhan's judicial administration system have also been keeping an eye on all sorts of social discord since the beginning of epidemic prevention.

After receiving a report that a dispute over an entrance permit, which is necessary for residents to enter their residential compounds during the epidemic, had led to a physical conflict between a resident and community workers, Luo Hui, head of the local judicial station, traveled immediately to the mediation committee despite being injured in one of her feet.

With great patience, she finally soothed the anger of the two sides and helped them reach a mediation agreement.

"People's mediators across the city have been performing their duties diligently during the epidemic, nipping many disputes in the bud," said Huang Youhong, head of the division for people's participation in the building of rule of law of Wuhan's judicial bureau. "They have made positive contributions to social stability during this period of time."