Hospitals beef up security to cope with violence

Eighteen hospitals in Shanghai have hired extra security personnel to cope with rising violence against doctors and hospital staff, Metro Express reported.

Most of the extra security guards will work at the hospitals' administrative departments and emergency rooms.

The National Health and Family Planning Commission and the Ministry of Public Security recently released guidelines on improving security work in hospitals to stem a rising number of violent incidents against hospital staff across the country.

The guidelines require hospitals to increase the number of security guards and to install more security cameras.

Many hospitals in Shanghai have already expanded their security staff and patrol shifts, but the Shanghai Morning Post reported that the overall number of security staff in the city's hospitals falls short of the guidelines' requirements.

According to the guidelines, the ratio of security guards should be greater than 3 percent of a hospital's medical staff. Essentially, there should be one security guard for every 20 beds. Many major hospitals in the city, the Shanghai Morning Post reported, failed to meet that requirement.