A nurse working at the intensive care unit (ICU) of a hospital in Zhangjiagang City, east China's Jiangsu Province has devoted her spare time to sketch painting, providing comfort to her patients and their families.
Since beginning her career in 2020, Liu Na has been in a constant race against time to save lives, and sketch painting has become her way to find some relief from the pressure of her job.
Without any formal training, Liu taught herself through online tutorials and practiced in her spare time, gradually creating artworks that focus on her daily work, with the hope of bringing comfort to patients' families.
"The ICU is a relatively confined space. When patients are receiving treatment, their family members cannot enter. So I draw paintings to document the patient's condition. When family members see the artwork, it shows them that the nurses and doctors care about their loved ones," said Liu.
"I hope they will understand that our ICU is not just cold and gloomy -- there are lots of moments that they can feel our warmth and tenderness. It is a reciprocal relationship," she said.
As Liu and her colleagues spend nearly every holiday working in the ICU, this Mid-Autumn Festival, she created paintings as gifts for the patients and their families. The nursing staff also arranged blessing flowers for each patient.
"I think it is very meaningful to have our work documented," said Chen Shunda, an attending physician in the ICU.
ICU nurse in China's Jiangsu creates paintings to comfort patients, families
China will take further steps to expand high-standard opening-up and create a new landscape of win-win cooperation in 2026, which marks the start of the 15th Five-Year Plan period (2026-2030), Commerce Minister Wang Wentao said in a recent interview with China Media Group.
Wang said opening up and cooperation for mutual benefit are integral to Chinese modernization. This year, China will actively expand voluntary opening up.
The country will steadily open up such areas as value-added telecommunications, biotechnology and wholly foreign-owned hospitals, while accelerating comprehensive pilot and demonstration programs for expanded opening-up in the services sector, he noted.
"We will expand the scope and regions of unilateral opening-up and ensure the implementation of zero-tariff treatment on 100 percent of tariff lines for all African countries that have diplomatic relations with China. We will vigorously promote the effective implementation of policies for special customs operations of the Hainan Free Trade Port, further enhance the level of trade and investment liberalization and facilitation, optimize the regional layout and coverage of pilot free trade zones, and support these zones in carrying out more robust institutional opening-up trials in areas such as market access, environmental standards and government procurement, so as to better leverage their role as comprehensive pilot platforms for reform and opening-up," said Wang.
Wang said China will promote the orderly planning of cross-border industrial and supply chains.
Efforts will be made to deepen economic and trade cooperation under the Belt and Road Initiative, enhance integration and connectivity across production and supply chains, and encourage cooperation in areas including green development, the digital economy, green minerals, new infrastructure and new energy so as to help build global production and supply chain partnerships that are equal, inclusive and constructive, he noted.
"We will give play to the platform role of overseas economic and trade cooperation zones, expand overseas marketing networks and explore international markets through outward investment, achieve mutual promotion between investment and trade, and advance the integrated development of trade and investment. We will also improve the overseas comprehensive service system and the national-level overseas comprehensive service platform," said the minister.
In addition, China will participate constructively in global economic governance, according to the minister.
In 2026, Wang said, China will pursue flexible and pragmatic approaches to negotiate trade and investment agreements with more willing countries and regions, while strengthening economic and trade cooperation under multilateral frameworks such as BRICS, G20 and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, to further promote mutual benefit and win-win outcomes.
China to expand high-standard opening-up to foster win-win cooperation: minister
