An internet healthcare company has announced the launch of a global epidemic-prevention and control platform in a bid to integrate medical resources from home and abroad to offer assistance to both Chinese and international friends overseas.

Working with the China International Exchange and Promotion Association for Medical and Healthcare, WeDoctor, based in Hangzhou, introduced the Chinese-English version platform, namely the Global Consultation and Prevention Center, so that in addition to the 1.4 billion Chinese people who were already enjoying its free online consultation services; 60 million overseas Chinese, together with hundreds of millions of international people, are now provided with real-time rescue services.

For overseas users, a simple following of WeDoctor's official WeChat account "guahaowang" may get them free online consultation services in various forms, including text, graphics and voice.

Epidemic-related science knowledge is also available to users. Currently, GCPC's free services are open to all countries and regions around the globe, aiming at helping people — especially those from places in a severe epidemic situation, such as Italy, Japan and Korea — tackle the current difficulties together.

As reported by the People's Daily, by 12 pm on March 14, there were a total of 63,119 confirmed COVID-19 cases in more than 130 countries and regions outside China. 

On March 11, the World Health Organization declared the viral disease that has swept into at least 114 countries and killed more than 4,000 people a pandemic.

"This is the first pandemic caused by coronavirus," said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

Liao Jieyuan, founder and chief executive officer of WeDoctor, said that for the current first phase, WeDoctor's GCPC invited 6,129 medical professionals from across China, all of whom were the attending and above physicians of the departments of respiratory medicine, infectious diseases, and general medicine from the country's 3A-grade hospitals.

"They are also experienced veterans in China's fight against the novel coronavirus outbreak," Liao added.

On Jan 29, WeDoctor launched the Handbook of Prevention and Treatment of the Pneumonia Caused by the Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) — the world's first Chinese-English version publication related to COVID-19. The handbook offers scientific epidemic-prevention and control guidance to both foreigners in China and overseas fellows.

As a main force in the fight against COVID-19 and the pioneer of the internet-based hospital, on Jan 23 — the beginning of the outbreak — WeDoctor launched its real-time epidemic-assistance platform, offering services, including free online consultation, psychological consultation, convenience clinic, Chinese traditional medicine consultation and remote consultation, to the 1.4 billion Chinese people. 

According to WeDoctor, by 10 am on March 13, the platform's accumulative visits surpassed 125 million, and a total of 48,581 doctors had offered consultation services an accumulative 1.61 million times, which was equivalent to the number of hospital admissions of a large tertiary hospital in nearly three months.

To offer special assistance to Wuhan in Hubei province, the epicenter of the outbreak in China, WeDoctor launched a "rescue channel in the air". In 10 days, more than 50,000 local people were provided with full-process services, including online follow-up visits, medical insurance reimbursement, and online drug delivery.

The National Health Commission had issued three guidelines in a row to make full use of "internet plus healthcare" and promote a new mode of online rescue on a national scale.