Even after surgery, the feeling in the tips of her fingers has not returned. Yet, she remains philosophical and insisted her job is to risk her well-being to protect someone else’s. The salary helps, too.
Chai earns roughly 30,000 yuan a month, more than 10 times the average wage in Beijing, “so we’re paid to face danger”, she added calmly.
Seeking protection
The security services market is also being boosted by customers involved in the country’sproperty, mining and financial sectors, which are also prone to conflict.
Xu Ming (not her real name), from Zhengzhou, Henan province, whose family owns development firms and hotels, told China Daily that, in 2007, she got bodyguard for her son- then 5 years old - after the attempted kidnap of one of her relatives. She said she also received several threatening text messages.
“Most people I meet from the business world have bodyguards for themselves or theirfamilies because there are so many kidnappings and acts of violence happening today,” sheexplained.
Coal mine boss Zhang Min (he also did not want to be identified) in Beijing saidhe hired an army veteran and martial arts expert to be his driver in 2008 as “mining is adangerous industry and very often I have to carry large amounts of cash with me”.
However, many businessmen and women are choosing to beef up their security simply because their competitors are. China Daily reporters posing as potential customers contacted a man advertising bodyguard services on Baidu, the Chinese search engine. He said he was willing to “slash enemies” and claimed he had “forcefully collected debts” for previous clients.
Luo Ying, deputy manager of CCG Security’s Beijing branch, said his company receives many calls from customers wanting “big-built men who can fight”.
“There is still a gray area in the industry that clients want bodyguards to use for violence. Some companies don’t reject (that kind of ) business,” hesaid, adding that there is also a habit of people hiring friends instead of professionals, which means there is arisk they could be untrained or undisciplined.
Zhang Hong at the Chinese People’s Public Security University said the current level of socialconflicts and crime is “natural” for a country with aneconomy at this stage of development.
However, other experts argue that the growing number of disputes over home relocations and migrant workers in recent years has exacerbated the situation.
After a spate of shocking attacks on school children in the summer of 2010, security firms said they saw a marked increase in the number of wealthy families looking for bodyguards to protect youngsters.
In 2009, the financial crisis forced many large factories to downsize or relocate, causing labor disputes or social instability.
Luo said he and his colleagues have been drafted in many times to escort company managers during standoffs with angry or sacked workers demanding more compensation.
The year of 2009 was the best on record for CCG Security, as well as for many others,and bosses expect revenues to peak even higher in 2010.
In fact, China’s nouveau riche are creating such a demand for protection services that many international firms are attempting to take a piece of the pie. One of them is GST Security Technique Consulting, a German company that set up offices in Beijing two years ago and is looking to further expand its operations.
As the firm’s general manager Armin Liebler put it: “No company can afford to ignore the Chinese market right now.”
December 3, 2010
Poor patients dicing with their lives
Illegal health clinics are cheap options that often prove costly mistakes,say experts.
He Na reports from Beijing.
Poor families and migrant workers in China’s biggest cities are putting their lives at riskby using illegal, cut-price medical clinics.
Botched treatment by “back-street doctors” killed at least six people in Beijing alone in 2009 and health experts fear that the demand for their services among low-income groups, particularly the migrant workforce, is on the rise.
Of the 3,000 unlicensed centers closed down by the capital’s health bureau in 2009, 3percent had caused either a death or permanent damage to a patient’s health, said officials.
One of those killed was Liu Lisheng, in his early 30s, a migrant construction worker from Shanxi province, who died after being given a fatal dose of penicillin at a clinic in the city’s Chaoyang district.
The laborer, who was complaining of stomach pain, was seen by a “doctor in his 20s” and was immediately hooked up to an intravenous drip, recalled colleague Li Jun, who was with Liu at the clinic. “Liu said he felt uncomfortable after the first bottle but the doctor insisted he have another. His face went deathly pale and he could barely speak.”
Realizing Liu was allergic to penicillin, the doctor gave him two antihistamine injections. The patient then collapsed and, despite protests from staff, Li called an ambulance. Liu was rushed to the city’s Oriental Hospital where he was pronounced dead.
“Doctors at the Oriental Hospital said whoever gave him penicillin should have checked if he was allergic first,” said Li. “We didn’t know it was an illegal clinic. We had no idea what could happen.”
The owner of the clinic, a man surnamed Wang from Anhui province, was detained by police and ordered to pay compensation to the victim’s family, said an official with the district health bureau. Wang had been caught practicing medicine without a license three times before Liu’s death. Each time he simply reopened his clinic once police left, said health bureau staff.
Police in the capital also detained a doctor surnamed Miao at an unlicensed suburban clinic in December 2009 following the death of a 16-year-old boy due to malpractice.