Chinese healthcare workers are on the frontlines of battling the coronavirus outbreak and several have lost their lives to the virus.

On Monday, the government announced that it will pay $716 to families of healthcare providers who have died, Shanghaiist reported.

Medics who have been infected, but have not died, will receive $429.

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Chinese healthcare providers are on the frontlines of the coronavirus outbreak, and several have lost their lives trying to save others.

The government is sympathetic to the families of those medics who sacrificed their lives at work to the tune of $716 (or 5,000 yuan), according to the English news outlet Shanghaiist.

On Monday the Wuhan Municipal Committee's Organization Department announced the new "sympathy" measures that it was taking to aid families of medical workers who have been infected or killed by the virus.

Workers who have been infected — but haven't succumbed to the virus — will also be compensated under the new efforts. They'll receive $429 (or 3,000 yuan), according to the Chinese-language People's Daily Client.

The death toll of a coronavirus outbreak sweeping China has reached 2,130, with more than 75,000 people infected worldwide. Eight people have died outside of mainland China.

Among the healthcare providers who have died is Li Wenliang, a 34-year-old doctor at the Central Wuhan Hospital. He was one of the first people to sound the alarm about the new outbreak in December, but he was silenced by the police in Wuhan and forced to sign a letter saying he was "making false comments."

Li caught the coronavirus after treating patients and died on February 7.

On Weibo, a Chinese social media site, users were shocked by the amount being paid to the families of affected healthcare workers, Shanghaiist reported.

"Is this missing a few zeros?" one asked.

"So the life of a doctor is only worth 5,000 yuan now?" another wrote, according to Shanghaiist.

According to Business Insider's Aria Bendix, China has less than two physicians for every 10,000 residents.

When the outbreak first began, it was unknown that the virus could spread from human to human and some medical workers went without protective gear.

In Wuhan, which has been in quarantine since Jan. 24, doctors are overwhelmed with patients. Some hospital workers have been wearing adult diapers because there is no time to use the bathroom.

"The hospitals have been flooding with patients, there are thousands, I haven't seen so many before," one doctor told BBC News early in the quarantine. "I am scared because this is a new virus and the figures are alarming."