The following is issued on behalf of the Hospital Authority:
The spokesperson for Tseung Kwan O Hospital made the following announcement today (August 3) regarding the interruption of the negative pressure system in two isolation rooms of Intensive Care Unit (ICU):
At around 1.50am today, the negative pressure system of two isolation rooms in ICU was interrupted and suspended one after another shortly. There was one patient with confirmed COVID-19 infection staying in each of the two isolation rooms at that time. The doors of the rooms concerned had been kept closed. Since it was anticipated that restoration would take some time, the two patients were transferred to other isolation rooms in accordance with established infection control contingency plan.
Staff from the Electrical and Mechanical Services Department (EMSD) found that the fuse of local motor control panel for the exhaust ventilation system of the concerned isolation rooms was broken due to rainwater seepage into the equipment enclosure of the said panel located at the roof of the building, which led to failure of the negative pressure system. At around 4.15am, the negative pressure system of both isolation rooms repaired by EMSD and resumed operation. The two affected isolation rooms have already resumed normal operation for patient use.
During the incident, all ward staff were equipped with appropriate personal protective equipment and no aerosol generating procedure was performed. The infection risk has been assessed to be very low.
The Hospital is highly concerned about the incident and has reported the case to the Hospital Authority Head Office via the Advance Incident Reporting System. The Hospital has also requested EMSD to implement improvement measures to prevent similar incident from happening again.
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