China Farmers' Life and Death Report

Author: Jiang Zexian
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-05-01
Features: I am a doctor with nearly 40 years of experience. I believe that memory retention must pass through the filtration and accumulation of emotions and conscience. The scenes of farmers' birth, old age, illness, and death have been filtered, settled, and accumulated in memory year after year, becoming so thick that they cannot be wiped away or dispersed, expanding, and even protruding, as if they need to erupt from the heart. Indeed, birth, old age, illness, and death are the laws of nature, and farmers are no exception. However, birth occurs in places where they should not have been born; death comes at ages when they should not have died; illness strikes without the rights they deserve; and old age is often accompanied by little or no family affection. "Illness is fierce as a tiger." Three or five years of poverty alleviation can be reversed by a single illness. Nowadays, illness is the most feared problem among Chinese farmers. As a conscientious professional doctor, the author of this book enters the homes of unfortunate families struggling under the storm of illness, recording the plight of farmers as they hover between life and death. A young woman at the peak of her life "died of difficult labor," and the "difficulty" lies in the fact that she lived in a mountain village with poor medical conditions, limited health knowledge, and economic poverty. In this cold winter, how many elderly people in northern rural areas can escape a cold or a minor illness? One "life" and one "death" mark the outline of a farmer's life. The deeply moving in-depth survey report on the health of Chinese farmers tells the nation that it is timely to share the fruits of human civilization and China's rapid economic development with farmers and urban residents.