Doctor who exposed China's cover-up of Sars crisis dies aged 91

Dr Jiang Yanyong died of pneumonia and other illnesses on Saturday, according to two of his friends. One said Jiang had contracted the virus in January in a wave that swept across China after zero-Covid curbs were lifted, although it was unclear if his death was directly caused by the virus. Jiang, who had been the chief surgeon at the Chinese People's Liberation Army general hospital before he retired, became a national hero by exposing the government's cover-up of the extent of the Sars epidemic in 2003. In the following months, Jiang wrote another letter to senior Chinese leaders denouncing the bloody crackdown on the 1989 Tiananmen pro-democracy movement - a move that led him to being detained and forced to undergo daily "Brainwashing" sessions. "Some people choose to let themselves get burned and pay a heavy price. Dr Jiang was such a person," said Hu Jia, a friend of Jiang and a dissident who has been under house arrest for over a year. Jiang, a Communist party member, had pleaded more than once with the authorities to reappraise the Tiananmen pro-democracy movement. In 2019, the 30th anniversary of the crackdown, Jiang again wrote to the top leadership asking for its vindication.