"Dear Premier Wen, I'd like to tell you the good news first. The problem I brought up at the seminar last year has been solved in Beijing," wrote 34-year-old, wheelchair-bound Li Nan to Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Jan. 20 this year.

The problem Li referred to was the high prices of one-off hygiene products that had plagued people with work-related spinal cord injuries for a long time.

On Jan. 31, 2010, Wen talked with a group of ordinary people in Chaoyang District in Beijing to get their opinions on the draft of a government work report that will be submitted to the national legislature in March.

Wen asked Li to be the first to voice her views at the seminar. Li said that patients with spinal cord injuries had to spend about 2,000 yuan (303 U.S. dollars) a month on one-off hygiene products because of their incontinence.

"My injury allowance is roughly 2,000 yuan a month. I have to live on my parents' pension," she said.

She suggested giving more attention to the employment and mental health of the disabled, and also for some revisions on the catalogue of drug and auxiliary devices for those disabled by work-related injuries. She also proposed more subsidies for these people.

Responding to the suggestions, Wen said, "Li Nan's case is far from an individual one. The disabled are a very large group of people in China who need more attention... We need to study, revise and renew the government regulations on work-related injury insurance."

Wen also encouraged Li to be optimistic in face of ordeals.