CHATTER AWAY: Overnight Open Thread

Buzzfeed News reports:

A doctor in Wuhan, China, who was silenced by local authorities after he became one of first to warn people about a mysterious infection taking hold in the city — the coronavirus — has now died after contracting the virus himself. Ophthalmologist Dr. Li Wenliang’s condition became critical and he died early Friday morning local time, according to a post from the Wuhan Central Hospital on the Chinese social media service Weibo.

In late December, Li began warning medical friends online of a SARS-like virus that was infecting people in Wuhan and had quarantined a patient in his hospital. Hours later, he was grilled by local authorities who asked him how he had obtained the information and why he had shared it. Within days, police also spoke with him. Police made him and several other medical workers sign a document promising not to spread further “false” information online.