Medical workers with the national traditional Chinese medicine team from Shanghai are taking care of COVID-19 patients at the newly-built Leishenshan Hospital in Wuhan.

Gong Yabin, the deputy director of the No.1 cancer department at Yueyang Hospital in Shanghai, has been sent to the newly-built Leishenshan Hospital, a makeshift hospital for treating patients with novel coronavirus pneumonia in Wuhan.

His wife, Zhe Zhe, an attending respiratory physician from the Shanghai Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital, was also selected as a member of the national traditional Chinese medicine team from Shanghai that was dispatched to support Wuhan.

Since the hospital was not fully completed when they arrived, Gong and his colleagues also had to overcome difficulties like cold weather and poor facilities. They furnished the wards on their own as well as doing other tasks, like sterilization.

From Wednesday afternoon, the section Gong belongs to started to accept patients and all of its 48 beds became occupied.

"Both of us are doctors. Now is the time that the country needs us most," Gong said. "The most romantic thing I could think of is combating the COVID-19 with her. After we get all these things done and the epidemic ends, we'll come to Wuhan again to enjoy the fruits of our efforts and the beautiful cherry blossom here."

Medical workers with the national traditional Chinese medicine team from Shanghai have arrived at Leishenshan Hospital.

At the Shanghai Railway Station Customs, Wu Jiaping, deputy head in charge of the health and quarantine, is busy working hard on designing plans and making arrangements to prevent and tackle COVID-19.

About 15 kilometers away at the Shanghai International Travel Healthcare Center, his wife Zhang Xiaohang, a local customs' technical support section chief, is conducting tests on samples delivered from different customs branches at her lab.

The couple, though separated at opposite ends of the city, are fully engrossed with the city's campaign against COVID-19.

"I've been working in the fields of international travel medicine and health and quarantine for long time. When I first heard the news of the epidemic in Wuhan in December, I had a feeling that something unpleasant would happen because the time and cause of it is like SARS which swept China in December 2002," Wu told Shanghai Daily.

Then Wu began asking colleagues to be careful and pay attention to the spread of the epidemic as well as making preparations for setting a mechanism on the prevention and control of COVID-19 at the railway station. They also checked the inventory of required supplies and restocked those in shortage, along with performing maintenance on devices used for testing.

"Now it's time to use my knowledge and the possible risks will never obstruct me from fulfilling my duty," Wu said. "By my side, my colleagues, no matter old or young, leader or general custom officer, are all working hard and spending the holiday at their own workplaces. My wife sometimes works on samples at her lab into the night."

January 26 is his wife Zhang's birthday but they couldn't celebrate it together. "Our parents also understand us and told us not to worry about them."

Wu said he is always ready to do any work on the frontline of COVID-19 prevention and control. And he will continue to train other customs officers with knowledge related to the epidemic to ensure none of them will be infected.

Medical workers with the national traditional Chinese medicine team from Shanghai are working at Leishenshan Hospital.