A growing number of volunteers is stepping up. Wang Xiaoyu reports from Ruili, Yunnan, with Li Yingqing in Kunming.
Having viewed many posts about Ruili, Yunnan province, on Douyin, a short-video app, Qin Yao saw the city as a wonderland of exotic culture based around the Dai and Jingpo ethnic groups, immersive carnivals and festivals.
"I heard that people wandering around the city might accidentally find themselves stepping into a village in neighboring Myanmar," the 21-year-old said of the posts she saw on the app, which is known in the West as TikTok.
"It sounded fascinating, so I always wanted to visit the city."
In the event, she visited Ruili earlier than she had planned, but not as a tourist.
Right after she graduated from a vocational college for health studies in late June, Qin arrived in the city as a healthcare worker on the front line of the COVID-19 battle.
Ruili, hemmed in by Myanmar on three sides, shares a long border that has few natural barriers. For decades, residents on both sides have been in close contact, with about 50,000 border crossings a day before the outbreak.
Amid the raging pandemic, the city's proximity to Myanmar has pitted it in a tough and protracted battle against the novel coronavirus and COVID-19.
'Qualified and needed'
When Qin arrived, the city was combating its third outbreak－the first triggered by the highly transmissible Delta variant.
"I was hunting for a job and found that the city was recruiting healthcare workers to fight the virus. I figured that as a newly graduated healthcare worker, I would be qualified and needed here, so I quickly sent off an application," said the native of Yunnan's Dali Bai autonomous prefecture, about six hours' drive from Ruili.
"I didn't tell my parents that I was heading for Ruili until right before I got on the bus," she said.
"Even then, I told them that I would not be in close contact with confirmed patients and would only assist with ancillary work."
In reality, she had been employed to undertake a wide variety of jobs, from treating the open wounds of people undergoing quarantine, to sanitizing rooms and helping to transfer patients.
"The first time I knew that a patient I had helped at a designated hotel had later tested positive for the virus, I did not sleep well for two nights," she said. "Now, I am more confident because I know that the risk of infection is very low if people abide strictly by all the personal protection regulations."
Before entering quarantined areas, Qin received a week's training provided by experts in the prevention of hospital-acquired infections. As knowledge about the virus continues to grow, such protocols are constantly being refined.
Qin said at least 10 of her classmates came to Ruili after graduation.
