2 killed, 21 injured in knife attack at hospital in China

At least two people were killed and 21 others injured in a knife attack at a hospital on Tuesday in China's Yunnan Province, local authorities said, in the latest incident of mass stabbing in the country.

The attack took place at around 11:30 am when a man assaulted people with a knife at a local hospital in Zhenxiong County, the county's public security bureau said.

The injured are being treated in the hospital, and the case is under investigation, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

It is not yet known whether police have subdued the suspect, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reported.

China, where private gun ownership is illegal for most civilians, has faced a spate of mass knife attacks in public places in recent years.

In August last year, two people were killed and seven others injured after a man with a history of mental illness attacked people with a knife in a residential district in also Yunnan.

In July of that year, six people, including three children, were killed in a stabbing at a kindergarten in the south-eastern province of Guangdong.

Zhenxiong County, situated in Yunnan's northeast, borders Guizhou and Sichuan provinces and, until 2020, was classified as "poverty-stricken".