Seven seniors dead after blaze at nursing home

Fire standards were overhauled following similar incident last year

Seven people were killed after a fire broke out at a nursing home in Huinan county, Jilin province, early on Wednesday, local authorities said.

The fire broke out at about 4:10 am at a privately-owned nursing home in Chaoyang township, with rescuers able to save 32 of the 39 senior residents, according to a statement by the Huinan news office, adding that the fire was extinguished by firefighters at about 4:30 am.

A county government spokesman said local authorities are still investigating the cause of the incident.

The fire followed a similar incident at a nursing home in Lushan county, Henan province, on May 25, 2015, which killed 38 people and injured six others.

The nursing home was later found to have used flammable building materials, and to have taken inadequate fire prevention measures, according to the State Council Work Safety Committee. The Ministry of Public Security's fire department launched a national overhaul campaign on fire prevention standards in nursing homes after that incident.

China faces grave challenges in caring for its rapidly aging population, with citizens aged 60 or above accounting for 16.1 percent of the population by the end of 2015, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

By the end of 2015, the country had about 116,000 nursing homes or facilities that offer nursing services for elderly people, up by 23.4 percent from the previous year, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs.