Imprisoned Woman Suffers Extremely Low Platelet Count Second Time in Six Months

(Minghui.org) Ms. Jia Fengzhi, a Beijing resident currently serving time for practicing Falun Gong, was resuscitated on May 16, 2022 due to an extremely low platelet count. Her family applied for medical parole for her on June 2, but the hospital claimed that her platelet level had returned to the normal range on June 6, and sent her back to the Tiantanghe Women’s Prison.

The latest medical episode of Ms. Jia, in her 50s, was preceded by an episode on December 10, 2021, twenty-two days after she was admitted to the prison. She had struggled with low platelet count in her younger years, but became illness free after taking up the Falun Gong spiritual and meditation discipline in 1996. The condition relapsed due to the physical abuse and mental distress she suffered in the prison.

Ms. Jia was arrested on November 9, 2019 for distributing calendars bearing information about Falun Gong, which has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999. She was sentenced to a 3.5-year prison term and a 35,000 yuan fine by judge Sun Guoli of the Pinggu District Court on September 7, 2020. She appealed the verdict, but the appeal was rejected.

After two years in the Pinggu District Detention Center, Ms. Jia was transferred to the Tiantanghe Women’s Prison around November 18, 2021.

The prison informed her family on December 10 that she had been taken to an intensive care unit. The doctor found that she had a severe stomach condition and rheumatism. She also had an extremely low platelet count, about 20,000 platelets per microliter of blood. Normal platelet counts range from 150,000 to 450,000 per microliter of blood.

After a careful diagnoses, the doctor found antibodies that attacked the platelets in Ms. Jia, rendering her unable to receive a platelet transfusion. The prison guards blamed her for not cooperating with the treatment and urged the doctor to discharge her.

While she was in a transitory detention facility before being taken to the prison, she began to have purpura (purple-colored spots on her body). She didn’t sleep well during the first few weeks at the prison.

The guards later forced Ms. Jia to receive injections in the prison, even though she disagreed because she had severe side effects when she received the treatment in her younger years, and the treatment itself had little effect on her.

After receiving the injections, Ms. Jia began to experience severe headaches, dizziness, palpitations, numbness in her arms, and even stuttering. She also felt sleepy and very weak. She reported the situation to the guards and doctor, but the doctor claimed these were normal symptoms for the treatment. While Ms. Jia was forced to continue receive the treatment, her platelet count remained very low.

Her platelet count dropped further, to 15,000 platelets per microliter of blood, on May 16, 2022, and she was taken to the hospital for resuscitation again. When the doctor claimed that her low platelet count had been treated with the only side effect being stuttering weeks later, her family worried whether the authorities were deceiving them in order to reject her medical parole.

Perpetrators’ information:
Chen Xiwei (陈熹微), secretary of Tiantanghe Women’s PrisonDong Xiaoqing (董晓庆), head of Third Ward of Tiantanghe Women’s PrisonXing Mei (邢玫), head of Tiantanghe Women’s Prison: [phone]

(More perpetrators’ information is available in the original Chinese article.)

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