Comment on the Report on Li Kenong’s Illness [I]
(March 4, 1953)
Comrade Shangkun [2]:
Kenong’s handling of his own illness in this manner is very dangerous. Please advise him to follow the doctor’s orders and rest, and he absolutely must not take his medication in that way.

Mao Zedong

[1] This comment was written on a report dated February 21, 1953, from Fu Lianzhang, Vice Minister of the Central People’s Government Ministry of Health, to Zhou Enlai regarding the illness of Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Li Kenong. The report stated that Li Kenong had suffered from episodic precordial pain since 1943, occurring once or twice a year. Last year it worsened, occurring five or six times a month. After returning to Beijing this year, it occurred every day. Last night he also fainted and was unconscious for five or six minutes before waking. This morning, the Soviet doctor and Comrade Huang Shuze conducted a joint consultation and diagnosed “coronary artery sclerosis” and “excessive fatigue,” recommending hospitalization for examination and treatment, but Li Kenong had not yet agreed. The usual dose of sleeping pills is 0.2 milligrams, yet he has taken as much as 0.8 milligrams. I have repeatedly urged him not to use them this way, as continuing such use carries the risk of poisoning.
[2] Shangkun, namely Yang Shangkun, who was then Director of the General Office of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China.