To celebrate the 75th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, the Immigration Department Youth Leaders Corps (IDYL) organised a five-day Shanghai summer exchange tour from July 22 to 26, and specially arranged for 75 IDYL members to join the tour in symbolic terms. The exchange tour aimed to give an opportunity for the IDYL members to look back on the history of the founding of the country and understand how young people in the country's post-reform-and-opening-up era had pursued and realised their dreams in Shanghai. The tour also enabled the IDYL members to have an exchange of ideas with local young people, inspire each other and join hands to create a future for the country.

     Addressing the opening ceremony on the first day of the exchange tour held at the Shanghai University, the Director of Immigration, Mr Benson Kwok, remarked that Shanghai was the birthplace of the Communist Party of China, and the place where the then young party members set sail to follow their dreams. The city later further developed into China's most important economic centre as well as one of the largest cities in Asia, where many young people nurtured and developed their dreams. He hoped that through the activities of the exchange tour, the IDYL members would come to understand the history and development of Shanghai municipality; ponder how to realise their own dreams; have an exchange of ideas with local young people, inspire each other and join hands to create a future for the country.

     Led by the Commissioner of the IDYL, Dr Cheng Kam-chung and members of the IDYL advisory committee, the IDYL members visited the Shanghai University, the headquarters of the social media platform Xiaohongshu, the intelligence technology company SenseTime, the state enterprise Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China, Ltd., and the Immigration Division of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in Shanghai of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. The exchange tour also paid a visit to the Memorial of the First National Congress of the Communist Party of China in particular on July 23, which was the opening day of the First National Congress of the Communist Party of China, to enable the IDYL members to learn about the history of the founding of the party and the country on site.

     In addition, the IDYL members also visited the National Anthem Gallery, the Shanghai Special Police Department, the e-sports enterprise SUPERGEN and the e-commerce company Meituan, to gain an understanding of the development of and opportunities in these industries. There was a chance for the IDYL members to interact with the local teenagers. Meanwhile, the Immigration Department Youth Ambassadors in Shanghai and volunteers from Shanghai University accompanying the IDYL members, introduced the life in Shanghai. The itinerary of the exchange tour also included workshops on experiencing Shanghai culture and learning Shanghainese, visits to the Zhujiajiao Ancient Town, which is known as the "Pearl of the south of the Yangtze River", and the Shanghai Disneyland. All these enabled the IDYL members to appreciate Shanghai's history and culture, and get some knowledge about the city's latest developments from multiple perspectives.

     The IDYL will, in the future, continue to organise exchange programmes of various themes, to deepen the IDYL members' understanding of the country's history, and strengthen their exchanges with the mainland, with a view to enhancing their sense of national awareness, and nurturing their love for the homeland.

                    

     The Centre for Food Safety (CFS) of the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department announced today (August 27) that a sample of goat cheese imported from France was detected with possible contamination with Listeria monocytogenes, a pathogen. The concerned batch of the product has not entered the market. The CFS is following up on the incident.

     Product details are as follows:

Product name: Ste Maure Touraine AOP Blister 
Brand: Fromagerie Pierre Jacquin & Fils
Place of origin: France 
Importer: Noja Fine Trade Limited
Pack size: 250 gram
Best before date : August 19, 2024
Lot number: J41920018

     "The CFS received a notification from the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed of the European Commission that the above-mentioned batch of product might have been contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes and is being recalled. Upon learning of the incident, the CFS immediately contacted the local importer for follow-up. The CFS has informed the importer concerned of the irregularity. Investigation revealed that the affected batch of product is still stored in the importer's warehouse and has not entered the local market," a spokesman for the CFS said.

     "Listeria monocytogenes can be easily destroyed by cooking but can survive and multiply at refrigerator temperature. Most healthy individuals do not develop symptoms or only have mild symptoms like fever, muscle pain, headache, nausea, vomiting or diarrhoea when infected. However, severe complications such as septicaemia, meningitis or even death may occur in newborns, the elderly and those with a weaker immune system. Although infected pregnant women may just experience mild symptoms generally, the infection of Listeria monocytogenes may cause miscarriage, infant death, preterm birth, or severe infection in newborns," the spokesman said.

     "In order to reduce the risk of listeriosis, susceptible populations such as pregnant women should consume freshly prepared hot food where possible, reheat chilled food until it is hot all the way through, and avoid high-risk foods, including ready-to-eat food such as cold cuts, cold smoked seafood, soft cheeses, salads, etc, or cook them thoroughly before consumption, even if they are presented as part of a dish."

     The CFS will alert the trade to the incident, and will continue to follow up and take appropriate action. 

The following is issued on behalf of the Hong Kong Housing Authority:

     To encourage and support young people in pursuing their entrepreneurial dreams, the Hong Kong Housing Authority (HA) has launched the Well Being·Start-Up programme, which offers shop premises in shopping centres under the HA for them to trial their business plans rent-free. The Secretary for Housing and Chairman of the HA, Ms Winnie Ho, and the Permanent Secretary for Housing and Director of Housing, Miss Rosanna Law, attended the "Dialogue with Star Entrepreneurs" event held today (July 27) at Domain in Yau Tong. They joined the sharing of invaluable experiences by successful entrepreneurs together with youth and shared their views to help young people prepare their start-ups.

     Ms Ho said, "The HA attaches great importance to youth development. By offering rent-free, well-managed shops with stable foot traffic, the Well Being·Start-Up programme genuinely helps young people kick-start their entrepreneurial dreams. The HA also hopes to leverage the vitality and innovative ideas of young people to provide a more diverse choice of products and shopping experiences for the community, bring foot traffic to shopping centres and achieve mutual benefits for both residents and commercial tenants."

     Miss Law remarked, "In addition to addressing the housing needs of the public, the HA also aims to create development opportunities for young people and encourage them to strive for success. The programme provides a start-up platform for young individuals to focus on developing marketing channels and promoting products. Also, there will be several awards in the programme to encourage young people to conceive innovative and feasible projects."

     The Well Being・Start-Up programme targets individuals aged 35 or below. The programme will run for seven months, from October 2024 to April 2025. It will offer about 10 shop premises in HA shopping centres across different areas in Kowloon and the New Territories for young people to start their business. Participants will not need to pay rent and will receive assistance with basic shop renovation and marketing. The HA will regularly review the business performance of the participants. If participants make a profit, the HA will charge 20 percent of their net profits to fund the programme to support its ongoing development.

     The programme will open for application from August 1. Interested parties will have to submit business proposals to the HA before August 31. The HA will assess the proposals based on innovation, feasibility and market potential, social benefits, financial arrangements and team management, and allocate suitable shop premises to selected applicants. The application form and details will be available on the HA website (www.housingauthority.gov.hk) on August 1.

     â€‹The Transport Department (TD) reported today (July 27) that it is following up an incident of overcharging of fares by a green minibus (GMB) operator.

     During its regular monitoring, the TD revealed that four New Territories GMB routes, No. 501A, 501C, 501K and 501S, operated by Fully Mint Limited, had since May 19 been charging passengers fares higher than the effective fares approved by the TD, with the differential ranging from $0.3 to $1 per trip.

     A spokesman for the TD said, "The department is very concerned about this incident, which is unacceptable. We are following up the incident seriously and have instructed the GMB operator and relevant Stored Value Facility operators to conduct thorough investigations and submit a report."

     "The four routes have resumed charging at their original fares since their first departures today. We have demanded and the GMB operator has agreed to arrange for full refund of the overcharged fares to the affected passengers. The GMB operator and relevant Stored Value Facility operators will inform the affected passengers of the refund arrangements as soon as possible and provide necessary facilitation. The TD will follow up and monitor the refund arrangements."

     â€‹Following is the transcript of remarks made by the Secretary for Health, Professor Lo Chung-mau, at a media session after attending a radio programme this morning (July 27):

Reporter: What procedures have to be gone through when deciding to transfer the cord blood to the child patient at the Hong Kong Children Hospital? What are the difficulties? What does the Health Bureau hope to achieve in the future regarding organ donation arrangements?

Secretary for Health: We are very grateful that all parties, including the Mainland bureaux and departments, have contributed to the smooth transfer of the cord blood stem cell from the Mainland to the Hong Kong Children Hospital. This required a lot of collaboration among different parties to ensure the cord blood, which was stored at a temperature of -178 degrees, to be able to be transferred seamlessly and in the optimal condition and temperature from the storage bank to the Hong Kong Children Hospital. This involved the Red Cross Society of China and the General Administration of Customs of the People's Republic of China. We are also very glad that our team of Hong Kong Children Hospital for haematopoietic stem cell transplant was highly professional and could provide services to the five-year-old kid who suffered from thalassaemia, which is a congenital disease affecting the blood production and causing severe anemia. 

     In the past, the only treatment is repeated blood transfusion every month or so. Because of the iron overload, they also require iron chelation therapy, but many of them can only live a life of 20 or maybe 30 years of age. But with this stem cell transplant therapy, the disease will be cured with the objective that they do not need any blood transfusion anymore, so they will be able to return to their normal life. That is really one of the miracles of advanced therapy. 

     These therapies are the objectives of the future development of Hong Kong as a medical innovation hub, including the stem cell transplant therapy, cell therapy such as CAR T-cell therapy and even genetic therapy, those are what we are going to develop. The Hong Kong Children Hospital is the centre of excellence for all these tertiary and quaternary services. We are concentrating all the expertise as well as the hardware. All these facilities are catering for pediatric children use. Even the environment itself is very friendly not just to the kids, but also the families. In the Hong Kong Children Hospital, we have accommodating facilities for the families, even single rooms, and the accompanying persons can stay with the kids in the room to take care of the kids. Also, the kids can have schooling; and in the play area, they even have art therapy and play therapy. These are very conducive to the overall development of these sick kids, who often have to stay in the hospital for quite a long period of time. 

     So we are looking forward to further development in collaboration with the Mainland, in particular I would like to highlight the rare disease centre. Rare diseases are never rare on Mainland China with the huge population of over 1.4 billion people, so we have a rare disease centre in the Hong Kong Children Hospital, with the expertise like geneticists and clinicians who are experts in these genetic diseases, in collaboration with our Hong Kong Genome Institute. And also in collaboration with the Mainland, we are developing a rare disease centre. Hopefully in the future, our babies and kids with diseases which are genetically-related, or extreme diseases like cancer and so, who require cardiovascular surgeries or neurosurgeries, will be given the best of care in the Hong Kong Children Hospital. Thank you.

(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)