The husband of China’s first cryogenically frozen woman, who suffered from lung cancer, has ignited moral debate after starting a new relationship while his wife is in cold storage.
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Sports industry professional, Gui Junmin, 57, made the decision to freeze his wife, Zhan Wenlian, in 2017 after doctors gave her just months to live.
He saw it as the only way to avoid losing his wife, in the hope that she would wake up if a cure for cancer was found.
Zhan, 48, became China’s first cryogenically preserved person after her husband, Gui, signed a 30-year agreement with the Shandong Yinfeng Life Science Research Institute.
The institute, founded in 2015, had partnered at the time with Qilu Hospital of Shandong University to carry out experimental human cryopreservation trials, offering free procedures to early volunteers.
In the two years following the procedure, Gui was firmly committed to staying single.
But in 2020, he had a severe gout attack one morning and was unable to reach his phone. He lay helpless for two days until relatives broke down the door and found him.