Norman Bethune was a member of the Communist Party of Canada and a renowned thoracic surgeon. In January 1938, he led a medical team to China to support the resistance against Japanese aggression. Upon arrival, he said, "I came to China to work at the front. The war situation is critical. Please send me to the frontline as soon as possible!"

At the end of March, Bethune arrived in Yan'an, the then headquarters of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in northern Shaanxi Province, with a large amount of medicine and medical equipment. Mao Zedong, the de facto leader of the Party, received him in person. In May, Bethune went to the frontline in the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei resistance area, where he organized battlefield medical teams to treat the wounded, took the lead in donating blood and organized volunteer blood transfusion teams, established hospitals, trained medical personnel, and compiled battlefield medical teaching materials. Sadly, while rescuing wounded soldiers, Bethune's finger was infected, which developed into blood poisoning. Bethune passed away in November 1939 at the age of 49.

In his last letter to Nie Rongzhen, commander of the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei military area, Bethune wrote that the two years in China were the happiest and most meaningful days of his life. Mao Zedong wrote the article "In Memory of Norman Bethune," calling on the whole Party to learn from his spirit of "utter devotion to others without any thought of self." The Central Committee of the CPC sent a message of condolence from Yan'an, which read: "The internationalist spirit of comrade Norman Bethune is worthy to be learned by all Chinese communist and respected by all Chinese people."