Couple puts duty before reunion dinners

Family delays Spring Festival to help fight the virus. Yuan Zheng reports for China Daily from Wuhan.

Spring Festival is China's biggest holiday for family reunions, but Yan Zhanfei and his wife, Tie Xiao, have not had a chance to meet their loved ones since then.

Instead, they have both been working on the front line of the fight against the novel coronavirus in Wuhan, Hubei province.

Yan, a police officer, and Tie, a nurse, were both born in the 1990s. They have left their 2-year-old son with his grandparents at home, and have been living in temporary lodgings since the outbreak began last month.

Since the lockdown in Wuhan started on Jan 23, Yan has been working outdoors to keep traffic running smoothly. Only vehicles whose drivers have been issued with official permits are allowed to use the roads.

Meanwhile, Tie has been tending to patients in the hospital. She has insisted that she won't see her family until the outbreak has been overcome.

The couple's only contact is via video chats they fit in amid their busy work schedules.

Yan has installed a camera at home so they can see their son and parents.

Every two weeks, he goes shopping for groceries for the family. To avoid close contact, he leaves the shopping bags at the door and the grandparents usually take them into the apartment when he has left.

Once, when Yan left the shopping at the door, his son saw him and cried out for a hug. To ensure the child's safety, though, Yan had to turn his back on the boy and walk to the elevator.

"My wife and I have agreed that we will have a family reunion meal after the outbreak to make up for our lost Spring Festival dinner," he said.