The Beijing city government has passed a new law that will protect "non-malicious" medical whistleblowers.
The law took effect Friday and states that anyone whose tip-offs are later verified would be rewarded, and suffer no penalties.
This comes months after a Chinese doctor was punished for sounding the alarm at the very beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
China's leaders suffered a rare wave of public outrage after ophthalmologist Li Wenliang died of the coronavirus disease in Wuhan, the city where the coronavirus first emerged late last year.
He had attempted to warn authorities about the new virus but was instead reprimanded for "spreading rumors."
Other medical whistleblowers later told Chinese media they were punished by government officials for discussing the outbreak without permission from superiors.
The new legislation is similar to a public health emergency law passed by the Shenzhen municipal government in August, which also vows to protect "non-malicious" whistleblowers from legal consequences -- the first of its kind
in China.
<Photo: Yonhap News>
