Law adopted

China’s top legislature voted on Saturday to adopt a law on the promotion of basic medical and health care in Beijing. It is the country’s first fundamental and comprehensive law on basic medical and health care.

Lawmakers approved the law at the end of a six-day bimonthly session of the National People’s Congress Standing Committee. The law will take effect June 1, 2020. The law bans any organization or individual from threatening or harming the personal safety or dignity of medical workers.

Top legislature

The 13th National People’s Congress will hold its third annual session in Beijing on March 5, 2020, according to a decision made by the NPC Standing Committee on Saturday.

The decision was adopted via a vote at the end of the bimonthly session of the NPC Standing Committee held from December 23 to 28. Also, the third session of the 13th National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference has been suggested to start on March 3, 2020, in Beijing.

Railway for Olympics

The high-speed railway line connecting Beijing and Zhangjiakou in Hebei Province will go into service today, China Railway Corp. said on Saturday.

The railway line is a major project for the 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. It will reduce the travel time between Beijing and Zhangjiakou, the co-host city of the 2022 Olympics, from currently over three hours to 47 minutes.

Cross-Straits flights

Civil aviation authorities across the Taiwan Straits have confirmed the additional flights to Taiwan for the 2020 Spring Festival, said Zhu Fenglian, spokesperson for the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office.

Air regulators on the two sides came to an agreement that the airlines of the two sides could arrange additional Spring Festival flights across the Straits from January 11 to February 8 to meet the needs of cross-Straits travelers.

College reading

The country’s college students don’t spend enough time reading, according to a survey conducted by youth.cn, a news outlet under the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League.

The survey, which polled 864 college students across the country, shows 45 percent of the respondents read less than one book each month, and nearly half read for less than 30 minutes each day.(SD-Agencies)