KLANG, Sept 28 (Sin Chew Daily) — After his recovery, a COVID-19 patient jogs at home in a charity run for one whole month to raise funds for the purchase of tablets for poor students.

Xu Zheng Qiang started jogging at home three weeks after he had recovered from COVID-19 in a charity run organized by the youth and women’s wings of Klang Hokkien Association held in conjunction with the association’s 17th anniversary.

Xu, 53, who lives in Taman Bayu Perdana, Klang, jogged a total of 663km in a month to raise RM331.50.

He tested positive in the RT-PCR test on July 27 while his wife was negative.

His two daughters, aged 20 and 22, had tested positive earlier.

Xu had signed up for the charity run prior to the COVID-19 test. All three of them were observing quarantine at home and reported to the health authorities on a daily basis as they were only suffering from mild symptoms.

He started jogging on the treadmill at home for an hour on August 18, then gradually increased the duration of jogging to two hours, three hours and the longest jog was four hours and 30 minutes.

Xu normally jogged for two hours on the treadmill then ran up the stairs of his double-story house for 15 minutes before resuming his jog on the treadmill.

The charity run organist was targeting to recruit 150 runners to run from August 17 to September 16 for an accumulated distance of 50,000km to raise RM25,000 in order to buy 50 tablets for poor students to attend online classes at home.

Each kilometer generates RM0.50 for the charity fund.
A total of 144 joggers took part in the event and clocked 46,133.21km in one month while well-wishers chipped in RM32,505.50, a sum higher than the targeted sum of RM25,000.
Xu was happy he hit the 600km target he had set for himself in one month.

“This is the first time I have completed a charity run at home for fear that I may spread the virus to others,” he said.

A sales manager for the Southeast Asia region, Xu has been working from home since the lockdown.

Prior to being infected, he rarely left home except to buy necessity items.

After recovering from the infection, Xu said his entire family stayed home and bought groceries online except for driving his daughter to a national vaccination center for her second dose of vaccine.

“All of us wear masks at home. I only remove the face mask while I am running.

“I have not left my home so far as I do not wish to spread the virus to other people after my recovery,” he said.

Xu tested positive for COVID-19 two weeks after he completed his second dose of vaccine.