Shanghai gives quake town a lift

Source: Shanghai Daily | 06-25-2008 12:27

Special Report:   Post-quake reconstruction
Special Report:   Strong quake jolts SW China

BEIJING, June 25 -- The Shanghai Tongji Urban Planning & Design Institute has won the bid for the final reconstruction plan for Dujiangyan in the earthquake-hit Sichuan Province.

Shanghai's Mayor Han Zheng announced the start of 23 reconstruction projects in Dujiangyan Tuesday, marking the first step of a more than three-year aid plan to rebuild the popular tourist destination.

Shanghai pledged to offer facilities and equipment needed in Dujiangyan. Experts and professionals in education, medicine and talent training will be dispatched to the county-level city, Han said.

The Shanghai Public Health Bureau announced yesterday that 284 local medical staff would be sent to Dujiangyan before Sunday to help resume health services in the city.

Local health authorities said they planned to help Dujiangyan, the designated target of Shanghai's help on reconstruction work, rebuild its health system, which suffered severe destruction during the earthquake.

Hospitals and disease prevention centers in the city have been designated partners in Dujiangyan, officials said.

"Under our schedule, all the city and district-based medical facilities and temporary shelters for quake victims in Dujiangyan should start to provide basic health services by next month and all temporary medical facilities should finish being built and begin proper operation by September," said Song Guofan, a health bureau official.

Meanwhile, a team of social workers from the East China University of Science of Technology will set out to Dujiangyan to offer psychological aid at the shelters.

The team will stay in Dujiangyan for about a month to help the earthquake survivors reconstruct their social relations in the shelter, said Zhang Yu, vice dean of ECUST's school of social work and public administration.

"We have been there to study the survivors' psychological condition soon after the earthquake," said Zhang.

"We found the families there have been greatly affected, even families whose members all survived the disaster."

Farm machinery valued at 1 million yuan (145,560 U.S. dollars), offered by the Shanghai Agricultural Commission, will arrive in Dujiangyan today.

 

Editor:Xiong Qu