Author Archives: hksar gov

     The Government announced today (February 3) that in light of the deteriorating COVID-19 situation in Hong Kong and that the number of new cases recorded daily stays high, a series of measures would be taken with a view to immediately enhancing Hong Kong’s capacity in guarding against the epidemic and containing further spread of the virus.
      
     The current epidemic development of Hong Kong is of grave concern. Over the past week, cases detected in Hong Kong have increased from 115 (January 28) to 121 (February 3). Although the overall increase may not be significant, the number of cases with unknown sources has raised from 6 to 31 per day. Such cases with unknown sources have exceeded 100 in total, involving various districts in the city and different industry sectors. At the same time, the number of samples tested positive under sewage surveillance has raised from 11 (January 28) to 21 (February 2), also spreading across the city. Different indications show that various silent transmission chains are still active in the community even though the mass outbreak in Kwai Chung district has subsided. It is worrying that the transmission chains show signs of spreading to various districts in Hong Kong with an increasing trend of cases to be recorded.
      
     Given the incredibly high transmissibility of Omicron mutant strain, especially its BA.2 form, which clearly involves short-range air-borne transmission, the possibility of an exponential increase in infected cases is now on a rise. Although there are signs that Omicron is less likely to cause severe complications, it may still lead to a higher incidence of serious cases or death during mass infection. On the other hand, there is a continuous stream of local cases involving the more lethal Delta mutant strain. Recently, an unvaccinated person who was infected with Delta mutant strain turned critically ill with the need of admission to the intensive care unit. With Hong Kong facing the threat of both mutant strains, the outlook for epidemic development is not optimistic.
      
     Since the beginning of the fifth wave of the epidemic last December, the Government has swiftly launched a series of anti-epidemic measures, including the implementation of the most stringent social distancing measures. However, public transport patronage figures show that the people flow within Hong Kong has merely dropped by around 20 per cent in the recent period as compared with regular days, which pales in comparison with the 30-50 per cent drop during the troughs for people flow under the previous waves. Besides, citizens were still having many social activities during the Chinese New Year. The Government expects that the number of infected cases may show a significant, or even exponential increase after the Chinese New Year. To avoid further worsening of the epidemic, the Government needs to adopt a multi-pronged approach by rolling out anti-epidemic initiatives to reduce people flow through maintaining the most stringent social distancing measures and significantly enhance testing capacity for the virus. It is hoped that citizens may fully co-operate to achieve the objective of “early identification, early isolation and early treatment”.
      
     The Government again urges citizens to conduct tests early whenever they consider themselves at higher risk or show any mild symptoms. The Government will also adopt a more proactive testing strategy to identify patients and cut transmission chains in the community as early as possible, and calls for active co-operation from citizens in various testing operations. The Government has been working with contractors of testing services to enhance the testing capacity, aiming to significantly raise the daily maximum capacity of public and private laboratories from approximately 100 000 tests to about 200 000 tests before mid-February.   
      
     The Government will closely monitor cases and sewage surveillance results to conduct operations under restriction-testing declaration and compulsory testing notice. The Government will also distribute a mass number of COVID-19 rapid test kits to citizens in high-risk districts for them to conduct self-tests. In addition, the Government will adjust isolation and quarantine policies in a timely manner to make better use of treatment, isolation and quarantine facilities, with a view to providing treatment to severe patients, controlling infection risk and containing the spread of virus effectively. This serves to prevent a mass outbreak from paralysing the local healthcare system.
      
     The Government strongly urges citizens to reduce social activities, and not to organise or participate in gatherings among families. Citizens are urged to stay home and not to go out unless necessary, especially for visits to crowded shopping malls, public facilities and places, to help contain the epidemic. This can prevent relatives and friends from being infected or classified as close contacts for quarantine or isolation, and also protect public health.
      
     The Civil Service Bureau has announced that bureaux and departments would implement the special work arrangements from tomorrow (February 4) till February 11. Save for those involved in the provision of emergency services and essential public services and in anti-epidemic efforts, other government employees will be arranged to work from home. The Government calls on employers to follow suit and arrange their staff to work from home in order to minimise people flow and social contacts across the city.
      
     The Government gazetted earlier the extension of existing social distancing measures till February 17 and announced that all kindergartens, primary schools, secondary schools (including schools offering non-local curriculum) and private schools offering non-formal curriculum (commonly known as “tutorial schools”) would extend the existing arrangements on suspension of face-to-face classes and on-campus activities until February 21.
      
     The Government will closely monitor the epidemic development, review the situation from time to time and consider further tightening of social distancing measures, such as including more premises to be regulated under the Prevention and Control of Disease (Requirements and Directions) (Business and Premises) Regulation (Cap. 599F), tightening the restrictions on group gatherings in public places etc.
      
     The Government is well aware that the extension of social distancing measures and closure of premises will inevitably affect different trades and relevant practitioners. Funding application will be submitted to the Legislative Council Finance Committee as soon as possible with an aim to activate the sixth round of Anti-epidemic Fund and assist the affected persons to tide over the difficulties under a compassionate approach.
      
     A Government spokesman said, “The Delta and Omicron mutant strains are spreading in the community at the same time, posing unprecedented threat to Hong Kong. The epidemic situation of the fifth wave may be more severe than that of the previous four waves. Members of the public are urged to stay vigilant, wear masks properly and get vaccinated as early as possible in order to greatly reduce the risk of falling seriously ill and death when infected. With the concerted co-operation of the public in fighting the epidemic, Hong Kong will surely overcome the current epidemic situation.” read more

     â€‹In light of the special work arrangements for government employees announced by the Government, the Rating and Valuation Department announced today (February 3) that from February 4 to 11, 2022, the opening hours of its enquiry counters will be adjusted as follows to provide essential counter services to members of the public.

Opening hours of enquiry counters:
Mondays to Fridays, 8.30am to 3pm
 
     To reduce the flow of people and social contacts to curb the further spread of the virus in the community, the department appeals to the public to avoid visiting the enquiry counters in person unless they require services of the department urgently. Members of the public should use the department’s 24-hour electronic services (www.rvd.gov.hk) to submit forms or obtain information as far as possible. They may also contact the department by email (enquiries@rvd.gov.hk), by fax (2152 0138) or by phone at 2152 0111/2152 2152. Owing to the special work arrangements, the waiting/response time may be longer than usual. read more

     In alignment with the Government’s announcement on the expansion of the special work arrangements for government employees, the Land Registry announced today (February 3) that the service hours of its offices will be adjusted starting from tomorrow (February 4) tentatively until February 11. Details are as follows:

(1) between 9am and 1.30pm from Monday to Friday other than a public holiday for the purpose of delivering instruments for registration; and
(2) between 9am and 12.30pm from Monday to Friday other than a public holiday for other purposes.

     Customers may also deposit documents to be delivered to the Land Registry (excluding instruments to be delivered for registration) in the drop-in box located near the Information Counter on the Deck Floor, High Block of Queensway Government Offices, between 9am and 5pm from Monday to Friday other than a public holiday.

     Under the special work arrangements, customers may expect a longer waiting time for service. Customers are encouraged to conduct land searches through the Land Registry’s online search service (www.iris.gov.hk) as far as possible, and visit the Registry’s offices only if they require urgent services. For enquiries, please call the Land Registry hotline on 3105 0000. read more

     In the light of the positive test results for the COVID-19 virus from some sewage samples collected in Ma Wan; Tai Wo Estate, Tai Po (Lai Wo House and On Wo House) and Po Nga Court, Tai Po (Yat Wo House, Hing Wo House and Ka Wo House), as well as the Sewage Testing Area Kwai Chung Site 3A (Kwai Chung Site) (See Annex), the Home Affairs Department (including the Tsuen Wan District Office (TWDO), Tai Po District Office (TPDO) and the Kwai Tsing District Office (K&TDO)) today (February 3) started to distribute a total of about 38 000 COVID-19 rapid test kits to households, cleansing workers and property management staff within the areas.
 
     The TWDO today distributed a total of around 16 000 rapid test kits to households, cleansing workers and property management staff within the district through a property management company and the rural committee in Ma Wan. The TPDO distributed a total of around 14 000 rapid test kits to households living within the relevant buildings of the estates through property management companies. The K&TDO, together with the Housing Department, also started to distribute about 8 000 rapid test kits to cleansing workers and property management staff working within the Kwai Chung Site through property management companies today, in the hope of identifying infected persons early, so as to better protect the infected persons and their families. However, the Government stresses that rapid test kit testing is not a substitute for the Government’s compulsory testing requirement.

     For more information on the use of the rapid test kits, residents may refer to the following link: www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjLzD3-gab4.

     The Government appeals for the co-operation of members of the public to safeguard the health of themselves and their families by undergoing testing on a voluntary basis and fighting the virus together. The Government urges all individuals who are in doubt about their own health condition, or individuals with infection risks (such as individuals who visited places with epidemic outbreaks or had contact with cases that tested positive), to undergo testing promptly for early identification of infected persons to reduce the transmission risks of COVID-19.

  

     â€‹The Chief Executive, Mrs Carrie Lam, today (February 3) visited the Community Treatment Facility at the AsiaWorld-Expo, the North Lantau Hospital Hong Kong Infection Control Centre and the Caritas Medical Centre, as well as two contractors involved in the Government’s testing work, to meet with their medical and testing staff, thanking them for their hard work in combating the new wave of the epidemic in Hong Kong and extending her New Year greetings to them.

     Accompanied by the Secretary for Food and Health, Professor Sophia Chan; the Chairman of the Hospital Authority (HA), Mr Henry Fan, and the Chief Executive of the HA, Dr Tony Ko, Mrs Lam visited the Community Treatment Facility at the AsiaWorld-Expo and the North Lantau Hospital Hong Kong Infection Control Centre this morning to meet with their medical staff and receive briefings on the operation and provision of medical services to patients amid the fifth wave of the COVID-19 epidemic. Mrs Lam and the others then visited the Accident and Emergency Department of the Caritas Medical Centre and received a briefing by its medical staff on the operational arrangements and workflow of handling patients with infectious diseases at the department during the Lunar New Year. Mrs Lam highly commended the medical personnel for combating the epidemic at the frontline all along and sincerely thanked them for working day and night during the Lunar New Year to provide quality services for patients and safeguard public health of Hong Kong.

     To step up efforts to combat the fifth wave of the epidemic, the HA re-opened the Community Treatment Facility in several halls of the AsiaWorld-Expo on January 2 and 29, which currently provides a total of around 1 000 beds for COVID-19 patients who are clinically in stable conditions and able to take care of themselves independently. The North Lantau Hospital Hong Kong Infection Control Centre, constructed with the support of the Central Government, has 816 isolation beds, which are being put into use by phase subject to the epidemic development so as to alleviate the pressure on the isolation facilities in public hospitals.

     Mrs Lam then went to two testing contractors, namely Carelink Bioscience and KingMed Diagnostics (Hong Kong), to visit their staff and received briefings from their management on the provision of testing services in the community and further enhancement of their testing capability. She expressed her gratitude to them for their dedicated work during the festive season to fully support the Government’s anti-epidemic work. In addition to operating community testing centres, the contractors have been mobilising staff to set up mobile specimen collection stations in designated areas within a short period of time at the Government’s requests to provide testing services for local residents and other people in need.

     The Government strives to conduct “restriction-testing declaration” operations, compulsory testing, voluntary testing, etc, in various districts, having regard to the risk levels, to identify infected households through testing in order to cut the virus transmission chains in the community as soon as possible. Over the past month, with the full and prompt support of the local testing contractors, over 3.5 million tests were conducted city-wide. The contractors are now able to conduct a total of not less than 100 000 nucleic acid tests on average per day. The Government aims to increase the daily average testing capacity to around 200 000 before mid-February to cope with any sudden surge in testing demand.

     Mrs Lam said, “All along, the Government spares no effort in implementing testing strategies that are effective, targeted and most suited to the anti-epidemic efforts in Hong Kong in order to cut the virus transmission chains as quickly as possible. I wish to remind members of the public to strictly abide by the requirements of compulsory testing and “restriction-testing declaration” operations alike; and also appeal to all to pay attention to their health conditions at all times. People with suspected infection risks should undergo testing as soon as possible, including making good use of the rapid test kits distributed by the Government, to protect themselves and others. Let us work together to curb the spread of the virus in the community.

     “Raising the vaccination rate is crucial for Hong Kong to ride out of the epidemic. Besides providing effective protection for those vaccinated and avoiding severe cases or fatalities among them, it helps safeguard the public healthcare system against overload or even collapse upon any epidemic outbreak. The Community Vaccination Centres have resumed service to the public starting today, with an aggregate vaccination capacity reaching 60 000 doses per day. Meanwhile, the Government is working out the detailed arrangements for the ‘vaccine pass’ to be launched in the latter half of this month. I appeal to members of the public who have yet to receive vaccination, especially the elderly, to grasp the opportunity to get vaccinated as soon as possible to protect themselves; and to those who are eligible for the third booster dose to get vaccinated in a timely manner to enhance protection.”