Public calls for more efforts to make high-rises safer for passersby

Members of the public are calling for better measures to prevent deaths and injuries caused by objects falling from high-rise buildings after a 10-year-old girl in Nanjing was badly hurt on Wednesday, reports Modern Express.

The girl was hit in the head by the unidentified object while she was standing in a public square on Nanjing's Dongbao Road on Wednesday afternoon. She was rushed to hospital for surgery, and is now in a stable condition. The perpetrator was an 8-year-old boy who threw the object from the eighth floor of a building adjacent to the square, according to local public security authorities.

A screenshot shows a 10-year-old girl was badly hurt by an object thrown from a nearby high-rise building in Nanjing on June 19, 2019. [Photo: China Plus]

The incident comes three days after a boy was killed after being hit by a window that fell from a high-rise building in Shenzhen.

According to the current laws in China, people found to be responsible for objects that fall from high-rise buildings are liable for damages, but it's often hard to identify the perpetrators.

A security installs camera in Chongqing. [File photo: IC]

To stop residents from throwing things from their apartments, local authorities in Hangzhou have installed surveillance cameras in some residential communities. The cameras were installed with the approval of most of the residents. But they come at a price and the use of cameras risks infringing on the privacy of the residents.

After the incident in Nanjing, some online commenters have said harsher punishments are needed to deter perpetrators, while others said that property managers need to do more to ensure residential apartments are safe and don't pose a safety risk.