“China Post insists on treating special issues in a specific way, giving priority to supplies sent to Hubei, scheduling exclusively and making fast delivery. The number of postal outlets resuming work and production was up to 39,000 as of March 7. Postal outlets and delivery services are almost back to normal.” The Press Conference held by the State Council’s Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism on March 9 released relevant information about epidemic prevention and control as well as work and production resumption in the postal and express delivery sector. Wang Zhiqi, General Manager of the Department of Postal Service of China Post Group Co. Ltd., attended the press conference on behalf of the Corporation and answered questions from the press.  

In response to the concerns of how the express items in Hubei are delivered, Wang Zhiqi pointed out that the epidemic definitely has certain impact on mail processing and delivery, whereas China Post has guaranteed uninterrupted and continuous services by having all the delivery vehicles, packages, processing centers disinfected. As of March 7, Hubei Postal Branch has put into operation 17,900 employees, 877 outlets and 1,338 delivery departments, striving to ensure the delivery of items. Since the lockdown was imposed on Wuhan on January 23，Hubei Postal Branch has collected and delivered 3.55 million mail items weighing a total of 3,416 tons, including masks, medicines, residents’ daily necessities, textbooks and such. At present, 300,000 mail items are delivered every single day by means of contactless delivery so as to meet the needs of quarantine areas for postal service.

In view of textbook distribution, government document delivery and other services during the ongoing epidemic, Wang Zhiqi briefed reporters about the three initiatives taken by China Post in its epidemic prevention efforts. First, it has opened a green passage for voluntary transportation of epidemic prevention materials. By March 7, there have been 2,042 interprovincial mail vehicles and 72 sorties of aircrafts from China Postal Airlines bound for Hubei, of which 431 postal vehicles and 23 sorties of postal aircrafts have been dedicated to transporting epidemic prevention materials totaling 9,600 tons. Second, China Post has made commitments to  “four uninterrupted services (continuous services in postal outlets, the confidential communications, collection and delivery services as well as online services) and four free services for donations and medical supplies (free delivery, free home pickup, free mailing of private donations and free transfer of donated funds)”. Up to now, China Post has handled 3,394 transactions of charitable remittance free of charge with a total amount of almost 60 million yuan (about 8.49 million US dollars), and mailed 1,573 donated parcels for free, weighing nearly 15 tons. Third, China Post has donated 50 million yuan (over 7.06 million US dollars) to Wuhan. The Postal Savings Bank of China has granted 96.1 billion yuan (over 13.57 billion US dollars) of credit to anti-epidemic enterprises, issuing 27 billion yuan (over 3.81 billion US dollars) of loans. China Post Insurance has presented insurance to 245,000 individuals, including medical workers, journalists and postal workers fighting the epidemic on the front line in Wuhan. So far, China Post has provided textbook delivery service in 348 prefecture-level cities, sending over 12 million textbooks. Meanwhile, it has offered governmental services in cooperation with government platforms, handled 1.15 million transactions of police-related postal services and delivered 1.57 million tax-related items.