Practitioners Forced to Use Contaminated Materials to Manufacture Safety Gloves at Zhongba Women's Forced Labour Camp in Guizhou Province

During the three years I wasunjustly detained in Zhongba Women's Forced Labour Camp in Guizhou Province I witnessed irresponsible greed: in order to make profits, the labour camp would not even pass up used cerecloth, a fabric coated with wax and used for shrouds, to make commercial safety gloves.

In 2001 I was sentenced to three year's forced labour for spreading Falun Gong leaflets exposing the persecution and was detained in the Zhongba Women's Forced Labour Camp in Guizhou Province. The No. 2 Division had a workshop that specialised in making safety gloves. Except for the outside of the glove that was made from ivory-white canvas commonly used in the manufacture of safety products, all the inside layers were made from contaminated, discarded cloth recycled from funeral homes, hospitals, and refuse dumps. This recycled material was re-used, untreated, in the manufacture of these gloves.

The contaminated used fabric was terribly filthy and full of blood stains, dirt, and mildew. The smell was awful. It was common to assign the new arrivals in Division 2 to collect and sort the used cloth. The peculiar smell of decay, mildew, and rot made the sorter sick enough to vomit. Many of the prisoners assigned to sort this stuff could not eat, and after a while they lost weight. The labour camp did not treat them as human beings at all and did not even provide them with gauze masks or rubber gloves. The dirt and stains harbouring unknown germs and viruses filled their mouths and noses and covered their bodies. They said that they often saw death notices in these soiled rags as well as on the quilts that the families of the deceased had specially made.

I could hardly believe at first that the safety gloves were made from such material! However, after passing by the piles of contaminated rags again and again and seeing people gathering and sorting the gloves that had been made again and again, I had to accept this fact as much as it shocked me. After three years I have become accustomed to the truth that every corner of the Party's labour camp harbours evil.

A prisoner surnamed Pan once had a patch of broken skin on one of her big toes. After finishing a whole day's duty in the workshop, the next day her entire foot was infected and swollen. She told me that when she checked the quality of the finished products, the gloves were all around her, even covering her feet. Since she wore sandals in summer, her foot became quickly swollen. She eventually had to go to the clinic for daily injections, and the worsening infection was not controlled until one week later. She was forbidden to rest even when she could not walk and others had to carry her to the workshop.

It was quite common in this labour camp for any broken skin on the hands or feet to fester. In just one "new entrants" team there were several dozen prisoners whose hands and feet were festering. These incidents lasted for several years. Many prisoners did not have money to see a doctor and were in such pain that they cried and were unable to get into bed. When they applied to see the doctor, the prison guards asked them if they had a medical card. Hearing that they had no money, the guards would refuse them.

Some prisoners' infections were quite serious and lasted a long time. By the time their families learned about this and sent money, the infections were often out of control. Some people's infections left gaping holes and were severe enough to expose the bone. For one such person the antibiotics no longer worked and the 3,000 yuan¹ the family sent was used up and the sufferer was told her leg would have to be amputated.

Bedbugs were everywhere. Many people were bitten and had welts all over the body. As long the skin was scratched or broken, it would surely become infected and then the hands and feet would fester.

Note

1. "Yuan" is the Chinese currency; 500 yuan is equal to the average monthly income of an urban worker in China.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2006/5/24/128658.html