How China Built a Hospital in 10 Days

This video was made possible thanks to Curiosity Stream. When you sign up at the link in the description, you will also have access to Nebula, the video streaming platform that Wendover is a part of. The Wuhan coronavirus began, like all new viruses, with a remarkably unremarkable moment. In late November 2019, someone (it is not yet known who) ate a wild animal that happened to be carrying the new coronavirus, and

days

later began to feel symptoms of what initially seemed like a bad cold. From there, more individuals became infected, initially through consumption of other wild animals, but later through direct human-to-human transmission.

Throughout the month of December the virus was there, in Wuhan, spreading, but no one knew it. The cases, which presented as pneumonia, were at first considered to be caused by any of the countless viruses that can create such symptoms, but eventually the escalation of cases and the fact that almost all of the early patients had bought food at a particular wild animal market, caught the attention of the Wuhan city government. The first official confirmation that something was happening came on New Year's Eve, December 31, when the Municipal Health Commission published a press release acknowledging the situation, more than a month after the first transmission.

At the time, it was little local news: just a few dozen cases of pneumonia in a city of millions, in a country of billions. But then came the news that this was not one of the many pre-existing viruses that caused pneumonia. This was something new. Western media first reported on the new coronavirus around January 8. The New York Times, in a foreboding tone, wrote: “There is no evidence that the new virus is easily spread by humans, and it has not been linked to any deaths.” That would soon change. On January 21, when the World Health Organization began tracking the outbreak, there were 282 cases.

The next day: 314; the next: 581; then 846; then 1,320; then 2014; and at the beginning of the week of January 26, it was clear that this would not be a quick and painless virus. This would be a situation for the history books and it was going to get a lot worse before it got better. Drastic circumstances demanded drastic measures. It was clear, given the trends, that Wuhan

hospital

s would soon be overwhelmed by patients, and in the case of highly infectious viruses like the coronavirus, that makes the situation worse as infected people will try to recover at home, where the virus can more. spread easily.

Therefore, on January 23, the decision was made to build a new facility capable of treating 1,000 patients at a time: Huoshenshan Hospital. It was announced that this would be finished, completely

built

, by February 2, just ten

days

later. China has experience in such a feat. In 2003, the country suffered an outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, which is also caused by a form of coronavirus. As with the new coronavirus,

hospital

s were overwhelmed and many had to turn away patients. In response, the government decided to build a new hospital. For six days, 7,000 construction workers made Xiaotangshan Hospital a reality, which quickly began accepting patients and relieving the overburdened medical system.

Once the outbreak subsided, Xiaotangshan Hospital was hailed as a great success by both the country itself and the World Health Organization. The statistics speak for themselves. Overall, SARS had a mortality rate of 9.6%. At Xiaotangshan hospital, only 1.2% of patients died and no staff were infected. No wonder China wanted to replicate this and therefore Xiaotangshan was the model for the new coronavirus hospital, but this time it would be different. The 2003 hospital began construction more than six months after the outbreak began. The 2020 hospital began construction less than two months after the first case and just days after the severity of the outbreak became clear.

There was much less time for planning and design. The orders came and immediately it was time to start. The first step was to find a place to locate the hospital. The previously selected location was just an open field, about 14 miles or 22 kilometers from the center of Wuhan. This kept it away from the dense urban core, where further transmission might be easier, but the field in question was also right next to a large pre-existing road which made access easier. That road was quickly closed and essentially became a parking lot and staging area for the project. The contract for this project was awarded to China Construction Third Engineering Bureau Company, a subsidiary of the state-owned China State Construction Engineering Corporation.

By revenue, this is the world's largest construction company and has experience in huge projects such as Beijing's new airport, Egypt's new capital, and Tesla's Shanghai gigafactory. If anyone was going to pull this off, it was them. To begin construction in earnest, they first had to prepare the selected site. To do this, first all the trees and bushes were cut down and then the land was perfectly leveled. Of the 10-day construction schedule, this took longer than one might think: about 48 hours. This was partly due to the fact that the project was significantly understaffed in its early days as they struggled to find workers, especially as its start coincided with the Chinese New Year.

However, once the land was leveled, they continued with the construction of the building's foundation on Sunday, January 26. To do this they used a layer system. At the bottom was placed an 8-inch or 20-centimeter layer of sand, then what is known as a layer of geotextile, a form of fabric, then a layer of waterproof plastic, then another layer of geotextile, and then another layer of sand. . They then poured concrete, which dried within a few days. But then came the truly impressive element: constructing the buildings in a matter of days. What made this possible was the use of prefabricated elements.

Modular construction like this is booming lately. It is now a well-established technique for the construction of large and small buildings. The idea is simply that a series of identical building elements are constructed somewhere off-site. They are then shipped to the construction site and assembled. This has many advantages. First, using identical elements,

built

in a factory system, to construct a larger building reduces costs through economies of scale. Then, when you actually get to put the building together, the on-site construction time is significantly less, which again reduces the cost. In this case, however, cost was not the main concern; speed was, and modular construction is the fastest way to build.

Most of the site used a type of prefabricated modular construction common in temporary buildings. While it is not clear which company produced the prefabricated components, it is clear that they existed before the project began. The first elements of the building began to be assembled on Monday, January 27, just four days after the project began. They began by building the skeleton of the modular units. Each of these units was approximately the shape and size of a 20-foot shipping container, and this skeletal form included only the floor, roof, and structural supports at each corner. Throughout all of this, separate teams, among the thousands of workers there, began connecting the site to utilities such as sewage, water, electricity and internet.

Much of this simply involved bringing in the state-owned companies responsible for this, but for the Internet and the subsequent building of an IT system, private companies such as Huawei and Lenovo were involved. No doubt this was in part because the construction of this hospital attracted considerable public attention in China. It came to represent the physical manifestation of the country's response to the crisis and also of China's technological power. The construction process itself was broadcast by state broadcasting companies and up to 18 million simultaneous viewers watched the process. Almost all of China's major broadcasters reported from the site, publishing images like the ones you're seeing now, although very few Western broadcasters were there.

This is part of the reason why there is little detailed information and footage of the construction outside of China's state broadcasters, where the government can manage the story and what is broadcast. The Chinese government no doubt saw it as an opportunity at a time when it was facing intense criticism for its initial response to the outbreak. But of course, to earn those accolades, the project had to be successful. On Tuesday, January 28, important parts of the first building were completed, while the foundations of the rest of the complex were finished. During the 29th and 30th, more of the overall structure was formed, as walls were installed over and within the skeletons of the buildings, and then work began to convert these empty buildings into a hospital.

Each patient room was equipped with two beds, some medical equipment, and a bathroom. Considering the hospital was built with quarantine in mind, there are some unique aspects to the design of these rooms. For one, the ventilation system is designed to maintain negative pressure in all quarantine areas, so that air exits through an exhaust system, rather than out under the door into the rest of the hospital. . While it is not fully known at the time of this writing to what extent this coronavirus can spread through airborne transmission, a ventilation system like this is standard practice for any quarantine room.

In addition to individual patient rooms, separate areas were designed for patient processing, diagnostic tools such as CT scanners were installed, and other crucial aspects such as offices, break rooms, and dining rooms were built. During January 31 and January 1 and 2 in February, the final areas of the complex were constructed, the interior installation was completed and all systems were tested to ensure the hospital was ready to receive patients. Meanwhile, eight People's Liberation Army transport planes landed at Wuhan airport carrying military medical personnel who would work at the hospital. They moved into the facility on the same day, Feb. 2, and then overnight, workers put the finishing touches on the hundreds of rooms.

Then, the next morning, the moment arrived that seemed impossible ten days earlier: the first patients, transferred from other facilities, were wheeled to Huoshenshan Hospital, marking the beginning of its operations. They started with just a few dozen patients, but within days they grew to hundreds. Huoshenshan Hospital was just the beginning of China's plan to increase the number of beds available in Wuhan. Just three days after Huoshenshan opened, another even larger hospital called Leishenshan opened. Its 1,600 beds and 32 wards were built in just twelve days. Meanwhile, other hospitals were converted to isolate and treat coronavirus patients, and stadiums and exhibition centers were also converted into hospitals.

However, even with this quick and decisive action, reports indicate that many of the people with milder cases of coronavirus are being turned away from Wuhan hospitals. Unfortunately, it appears that the coronavirus, with its tremendous severity, is one of the few things that can overcome China. If you want to learn more about how viruses like this work from a biological perspective, Curiosity Stream has a fascinating short documentary about a previous epidemic: the Zika virus. There are a lot of things that apply to the current coronavirus outbreak and this is just one of the thousands of high-quality nonfiction shows and documentaries you can watch on Curiosity Stream.

Of course, the library you get through a Curiosity Stream subscription is now much larger thanks to its bundle with Nebula, the streaming platform created by me and many other educational creators. We made Nebula the home of our big, ambitious projects. My next Nebula original, a TV documentary, is filming right as this video comes out and will be released exclusively on Nebula very soon. To make sure you get to watch it, along with all the other great originals from other creators, sign up for the Curiosity Stream/Nebula bundle at CuriosityStream.com/Wendover. It's super simple: any subscription comes with Nebula, and at just $20 a year, this is the best deal in the streaming world.