Chinese seniors protest in Wuhan as government cuts medical benefits

Hundreds of senior citizens took to the streets of the Central Chinese city of Wuhan, to protest against Government reforms to the national medical insurance programs.  According to The Wall Street Journal, the protest that broke out on Wednesday, was against the move made by the Chinese administration earlier this month, to lower healthcare reimbursements. The seniors gathered outside Wuhan’s Zhongshan Park, which was less than a mile from the city government’s offices. As per the reports, the police in the region blocked off one side of the road outside the park and public transportation was barred from stopping in the area. 

In the rare sight of confrontation in the authoritarian state, the Chinese seniors who were holding out the protest were seen singing patriotic songs as a symbol of protest. According to The Wall Street Journal, in recent months, authorities in various Chinese provinces have rolled out reforms that would result in sharp cuts in the money paid to senior citizens. The matter becomes worse since this section of society has been the most vulnerable section in the recent surge of deadly COVID-19 cases in China. The Xi Jinping administration gave the local governments the flexibility to determine the timetable and the scale of the cuts. 

Protests came weeks ahead of annual legislative meetings

According to The Wall Street Journal, the protests came just weeks ahead of the annual legislative meeting in Beijing. In the legislative meetings, senior leaders are expected to unveil new fiscal policies. While the communist regime has decided to hand over the steering wheel to the local governments over the issue, the Chinese government have been facing fiscal imbalance for a very long time. The deadly COVID-19 pandemic has made the whole situation worse. The Pandemic has also stretched the public health system to a great extent as well. While the major public funding was relegated to countering the virus, the medical infrastructure was left highly strained due to the recent outbreak and bed shortages. 

In the city of Wuhan, where the first-ever case of COVID-19 was detected. The authorities decided to implement the reforms on February 1, the decision led to the eruption of protests all over the city. To express their discontent with the government, some of the protestors sang, “The Internationale”. The song is the 19th-century socialist anthem. Similar protests also broke out in the Northeastern city of Dalian, where the seniors gathered outside the local government office.