Editor's note: In the battle with the COVID-19 epidemic, more and more fighters are coming to its front lines, including students and former students of the Open University of China (OUC). Like other fighters, no matter how ordinary, they are contributing what they can. Let's take a close look at some of their stories.

"I cleaned up and disinfected 42 rooms in the morning."

"37 more rooms in the afternoon."

"The power to room 1210 has been restored."

"The locks of the two rooms have been fixed."

These messages were in a brief report Chen Hua delivered to the WeChat group of the New Beacon Hotel's isolation area on 19 February 2020. His efficiency has amazed everyone there.

Chen Hua is head of the production department of Xinzhonghe Inc., part of the Industrial Development and Investment Group, and has been undertaking food delivery and disinfection in the new Beacon Hotel isolation area for 18 days without a break. He is also a student in Class 2 of Administrative Management, a junior-college programme, at the East West Lake campus of the Wuhan Branch of the Open University of China (OUC) (autumn 2018). While helping fight the epidemic, he continues to study online.

When the isolation centre was set up, Chen Hua and two colleagues were made responsible for meal delivery; the first time, it took them more than an hour to deliver breakfast. They were afraid, and just left the meal bags at doors. Some patients had cold meals as a result. For the second meal, Chen Hua proposed a new system: making one person responsible for two floors, announcing each meal by knocking and shouting, and only continuing after receiving a reply. Since then, patients have had only hot meals. With some being transferred to hospitals, vacated rooms needed disinfecting, and Chen Hua volunteered for this duty. On his first day with the team, finding the manual sprayer exceedingly heavy, he bought an electric sprayer at his own expense and donated it to the centre. The efficiency of the work has greatly improved as a result.

The isolation centre has 125 rooms on 6 floors, a total living area of 4,200 ㎡, with 1200 ㎡ of common room. Because of the heavy workload and urgency of disinfection, cutting into the time for meal delivery and medical checkups, Chen Hua often works until after 10 pm.

19 February was a special day. The isolation centre, having accepted suspected patients for 16 days, was now named a diagnostic centre for people with fever. Over 100 residents were transferred, and all vacated rooms disinfected in preparation for the new patients. Throughout the day, everyone cooperated, and Chen Hua' s work was central. Disinfection requires both physical effort and careful attention, consisting of a preliminary round, followed half an hour later by cleaning of all articles left behind, a second round of disinfection, and then one hour of ventilation. Only fully ventilated rooms were ready for use. Chen Hua is not only careful but considerate, and made an effort to ensure that items left behind were returned to the families of their owners.

He works from early in the morning in airtight protective clothing that makes him sweat, and blurs his vision. But he persists, and after every vacancy commences disinfection, knowing that the efficiency of the centre as a whole is tied to his own.

The isolation centre is a special place, and to maintain safety, only food-delivery, disinfection, and medical personnel are allowed to enter and leave. Therefore, staff tend to be relied on as bridges between patients and their families, acting as "couriers" of items such as drugs and other necessities. Chen Hua has also put to use his knowledge he gained for taking the operation certificate of an electrician by helping to restore power to two rooms, much to the gratitude of their residents.

Chen Hua's brothers and sisters are also helping control the epidemic, and he has taken in his mother, who is nearly 80. However, since beginning work at the isolation centre, he has not returned home, but promised everyone that when this was over, they would all have a good meal together!

Chen Hua is an admirable model of someone fighting the epidemic with resilience, bravery and wisdom.

By OUC News Network