Charity under fire for misallocation of donations

An established charity in Hubei province on Saturday apologized for the mismanagement of surgical masks and other protective gear donated to relieve the medical supply shortage in Hubei, the center of the novel coronavirus outbreak.

In response to online outrage over its poor handling of donations, the Red Cross Society of China Hubei Branch said on its website it has convened an emergency meeting on Friday night to discuss the problems involving distribution, and pledged to hold accountable people directly in charge.

The society, designated by the Hubei provincial government to manage epidemic-related donations to the province, said it will exercise more caution over the task and welcomed oversight from authorities, media and internet users. 

The apology followed a cyber crusade against the charity's inefficient and unfair allocation of medical supplies. 

Despite continuous donations from across the nation, a number of hospitals treating coronavirus patients in Hubei said they were still grappling with a severe shortage of protective gear against the contagious pathogen.

Netizens noticed the charity allocated 3,000 surgical masks to Wuhan Union Hospital of China, a major battleground for the outbreak, compared with 16,000 - later revised to 18,000 - surgical masks each to two other hospitals with no such patients, according to a resource distribution list released by the charity organization on Wednesday. 

In a statement on Friday, the charity said the 36,000 surgical masks given to the hospitals with no infected patients are model KN95, which is suitable for everyday protection but cannot be used by medical staff on the frontline, but admitted the organization had management problems.