Chongqing, CHINA - Let’s go back to March 2020 when a resident of the Chinese city of Chongqing was reported missing. He reportedly suffered from a mental illness and the police started looking for him. A few weeks later, the man’s family members found out that he had been taken into care in a hospital in the city of Wenzhou and when they arrived, they were told that he was in intensive care and unlikely to survive due to complications caused by tuberculosis.
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The patient’s uncle failed to identify him due to the oxygen mask he was wearing. Relatives decided to bring the man home and he diedshortly afterwards. Following the sanitary measures put in place due to the coronavirus, the body was quickly cremated and the parents did not even have the chance to see their son. More than 140,000 yuan (more than £16,000) was spent on the funeral.
Found two months after ‘his death’
At the end of May, the police contacted his forty-year-old uncle to inform him that a homeless man posing as his nephew had been found. The missing man was transferred to Chongqing and reunited with his family on 5th July. However, the identity of the man who was mistaken for his nephew and cremated remains a mystery. The victim actually had papers identifying him as the missing person! And to make things weirder, the resemblance between the two men really was striking.
Family and hospital disagreement
Due to this incredible situation, the family has asked the hospital for compensation for confusing the patient with another Chongqing resident, while doctors have stipulated that the family had the chance to identify the patient themselves.
‘We took a picture and sent it to the police. It was the police’s responsibility to identify the person and contact the family,’ said Liu Xiao, chief ER doctor at the hospital.
