Editor's Note:
Tsinghua SIGS students have joined the fight against COVID-19 by participating in prevention and control work in their communities. In SIGS Volunteers, they share their experiences.
1/ Huang Xinmei, Division of Information Science and Technology
Hometown: Fuzhou, Fujian
I heard about the opportunity for volunteering from the hospital where my parents work. I joined to do my part to help in the COVID-19 prevention and control efforts.
My responsibilities included taking people’s temperature as they entered the hospital and checking their personal and health code information. In my work as a volunteer, I encountered a lot of people. Some were anxious because they didn’t know how to use the health code app; others were very cooperative. I was happy to be able to do my part to help others.
2/ Zhang Yongxiang, Division of Logistics and Transportation
Hometown: Nalou Village in Baise, Guangxi
From when the COVID-19 control measures began on February 7th to when our village was released from lockdown on the 14th, I was the head of volunteers. I was mainly in charge of volunteer training and placement and organizing the layout of testing points along with registering information and supporting medical staff doing door-to-door testing. We worked for over 10 hours a day.
When the COVID-19 breakout began in Baise and our city was placed under lockdown, six checkpoints were set up around the village that needed to be manned. Some of the checkpoint shifts were 24 hours long. We didn’t have enough volunteers, so I recruited university and high-school students to help. We all helped to put up anti-epidemic-related signs at the checkpoints and register cars.
During this time, the city instructed the village to test all its residents. During the mass testing, I oversaw the training of volunteers. During several of the mass testing rounds, I also helped with set-up at the testing points and carefully registering villagers’ information. Medical staff came from Wuzhou (another city in Guangxi) and during the testing process, I interpreted the local dialect for them. I also went door-to-door with them to test several elderly villagers. With everyone’s hard work, we completed four rounds of mass testing.
During this time, especially during the wet and cold weather of the winter, I began to understand the challenges of COVID-19 control in our village: not enough manpower, resources, or experience with epidemic control measures, etc. The support given by the medical team from Wuzhou and people from different parts of the country to the residents of Baise really moved me.
3/Han Zhuo, Institute of Materials Research
Hometown: Tongbai, Henan
I worked as an anti-epidemic volunteer in my hometown this summer starting from August 17. We worked in shifts. Every day, from 8 am to 6 pm, three to four volunteers stood outside our village’s service hall, registering incoming cars, checking the drivers’ temperature, and reminding drivers to take the necessary COVID prevention precautions.
In our work, we met some residents who were not always cooperative, but we tried our best to persuade them of the importance of COVID-19 prevention work. Over this period, I learned a lot from the town committee members, especially the importance of this kind of grassroots work. I admire their dedication.
Edited by Alena Shish & Yuan Yang
