People gather outside Hong Kong Hospital Authority on Feb 2, 2020 to protest against a planned strike by medical staff in the city from Monday. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)

HONG KONG - More than 100 people on Sunday gathered outside Hong Kong Hospital Authority, a statutory body in charge of all public hospitals, to protest against a scheduled strike by medical staff from Monday.

A majority of the members of the Hospital Authority Employees Alliance voted on Saturday evening to go on strike from  Monday in a bid to persuade the government to ban the entry of all non-residents who have visited the Chinese mainland. The move, they believed, would help prevent the outbreak of the dreaded novel coronavirus in local communities.

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Jason Lam, 50, an organizers of the rally, warned that the proposed strike that could put hospital patients’ lives at risk would be in contravention to medical workers’ professional ethics. 

He called on doctors and nurses to stay on duty and go through the crisis in solidarity with the public.

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Hong Kong Chief Secretary for Administration Matthew Cheung Kin-chung, in his Sunday blog, also appealed to the medical workers to stay united in the battle against the coronavirus threat, saying that the local government would fully support the front-line hospital staff.