A fire at a hospital in Beijing has killed at least 29 people and forced dozens to evacuate, a Chinese government official has said.

As clouds of black smoke billowed into the sky late on Tuesday, people trapped in the multi-storey building apparently tied bedsheets into makeshift ropes and escaped by climbing out of windows, as seen in videos circulating on social media.

Others took refuge by perching on air conditioning units on the exterior of the building.

Emergency crews managed to extinguish the fire, which broke out in the east wing of the inpatient department of Beijing Changfeng hospital, CGTN and other media reported, and at least 71 patients were rescued.

A local government spokesperson said that 26 of those who died were hospital patients, adding that the fire occurred in a wing housing critically ill patients.

Authorities blocked access to the hospital on Wednesday, while announcing an investigation into the incident.

Social media posts about the fire were either censored or deleted after they circulated for a few hours on WeChat.

One post still available criticised the hospital for boasting about its fire preparedness in a February article on its official WeChat account.

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