On TV, newspapers and radio, I have watched and heard so much about the deeds of the People’s Army soldiers who readily devote their blood, flesh and even lives for the sake of the people. But I have never thought that I would experience it by myself.

Not long ago, my daughter Jin Ha suddenly twitched her body and slipped into a coma on her way to see me working at a major construction site.

She was taken to a nearby military hospital. Few people thought she could survive. Military surgeons gave first-aid treatment to release her from convulsion, but failed to make her recover consciousness.

The following day, when I got to the hospital in haste, I saw my only daughter lying in bed, breathing heavily with her eyes closed. My heart broke down at the thought that I might never hear her cheerful voice and merry laughter. She often told me that she would become an innovator like her father if she enters the society after graduation from a senior middle school before long.

Her temperature crept above 39℃, pulse rate rose to more than 170 beats and respiration to 50 times per minute, and white blood cells were three times the normal level. Worse still, she was suffering from hydroperitoneum.

Surgeons said her symptoms were rare in clinical medicine and that they could be identified only in intractable diseases.

However, medical staff were not dispirited even at that critical moment. They put her under intensive care, giving her injections and observing her response. Her heavy breathing began to be smooth, but they persevered with treatment.

Nurses stayed up all nights for several days at her bedside to wipe sweat off her body and put things in order, just like part of her own family.

Thanks to their devotion, my daughter recovered consciousness in four days. When she asked for drinking water in a faint voice, all in the room broke into tears of joy and excitement.

Seeing them who were more pleased than I with my daughter’s recovery, I thought they were genuine guardians of human life and true communists.

In spite of her recovery, they did not relax but worked hard throughout treatment.

I asked myself: Who on earth are we? Why are all medical staff sincerely concerned about a daughter of an ordinary family?

They regarded us as part of the people whom the respected Comrade Kim Jong Un places high value on.

I extended my heartfelt gratitude repeatedly to the director of the hospital, and he said: “We have only done what we have to do.”

My daughter could be reborn and left the hospital with health again thanks to the selfless devotion of the medical staff.

Saying goodbye to the benevolent saviours, I said to myself our People’s Army soldiers trained by the respected Marshal Kim Jong Un are the best in the world.

Kim Yong Myong, chief engineer of the Pukchang Power Station Construction Machinery Station