As persons who resided or worked within the same building as the residence of local COVID-19 cases with the N501Y mutant strain will be subject to compulsory testing on the third, seventh, 12th and 19th day following the announcement of the relevant confirmed cases by the Department of Health (DH), the Government will set up a mobile specimen collection station at Tin Shing Court in Tin Shui Wai tomorrow (June 23) to provide free testing service for residents and workers subject to compulsory testing.
Community testing centres (CTCs) provide testing services for the public, including free service for persons subject to compulsory testing. Booking and walk-in services are available. Members of the public only need to provide simple personal information on the 24-hour booking system (www.communitytest.gov.hk/en). The system shows the booking status of the CTCs for the coming two weeks to facilitate public's planning and selection of a suitable testing centre and a time slot for testing. The CTCs will accord priority to serve individuals with advance bookings. As of 6pm today (June 22), there are around 20 000 booking places available for tomorrow at the CTCs, and around 82 per cent and 90 per cent booking places for the coming seven days and 14 days respectively. Members of the public may call the testing centres for enquiries on the availability of bookings or walk-in quotas before visiting the centres.
Coupled with the 14 CTCs, there will be a total of 31 CTCs/mobile specimen collection stations in various districts tomorrow to provide free service for persons subject to compulsory testing. The testing capacity should be sufficient to meet the demand. The opening dates and operating hours of the mobile specimen collection stations in various districts providing free COVID-19 nucleic acid testing services for the general public are stated in Annex. Persons subject to testing (including staff of catering businesses and scheduled premises), and those with "LeaveHomeSafe" COVID-19 exposure notification or SMS notification from the Centre for Health Protection (CHP) reminding them to undergo testing as soon as possible may receive free testing at CTCs or mobile specimen collection stations (if the service scope is applicable).
People whose test results are negative will be informed by SMS message through their mobile phones. Persons subject to compulsory testing must properly keep the relevant records. If any specimen tested shows a preliminarily positive COVID-19 result, the specimen will be referred to the Public Health Laboratory Services Branch of the DH for a confirmatory test. Confirmed cases will be followed up and announced by the CHP.
The Government reminds the public that they can undergo COVID-19 testing through various means. For details, please refer to the following webpage: www.coronavirus.gov.hk/eng/early-testing.html. If a person has symptoms, he or she should seek medical attention immediately and should not attend the mobile specimen collection stations or CTCs. The Government calls on the public and organisations to refrain from collecting more sets of deep throat saliva specimen collection packs than needed or making a profit through resale, so that others in need can also obtain specimen collection packs for testing. The Government will continue to closely monitor the number of specimen collection packs distributed and collected.
The spokesman urges all individuals who are in doubt about their own health conditions, or individuals with infection risks (such as individuals who visited places with epidemic outbreaks or contacted confirmed cases) to undergo testing promptly for early identification of infected persons.
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