Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor says at a news conference on Wednesday that residents can decide whether to get vaccinated after learning which brand is available at injection centers. (PARKER ZHENG / CHINA DAILY)

Hong Kong to date has secured 22.5 million doses of coronavirus vaccines, more than enough to immunize everyone in the city, Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor announced on Wednesday.

Lam also said the government is still seeking a fourth manufacturer in a bid to have twice the number of vaccine doses needed to inoculate the city’s 7.5 million population. Two shots are necessary to give a person immunity to COVID-19.

The Hong Kong leader’s announcement came after a special Executive Council meeting at which the council approved legislation empowering the city’s health chief to greenlight emergency use of vaccines for inoculation programs to avoid lengthy drug registration procedures.

In addition to the 15 million vaccine doses the government secured earlier from two sources — mainland-based Sinovac Biotech, and Germany-based BioNTech — the government obtained a batch of 7.5 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine developed jointly by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, Lam said.

Lam said that under the programs, Hong Kong people will be able to choose their vaccine by deciding when and where to get injected according to the vaccines’ availability.

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We don’t anticipate that there will be more than one type of vaccine available at the same time at a certain place for people to choose.

Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor, chief executive of Hong Kong

“We don’t anticipate that there will be more than one type of vaccine available at the same time at a certain place for people to choose. … But residents will know which vaccine is to be injected when entering an injection center and then decide whether to be vaccinated right there,” Lam said.

The government is also planning to set up an indemnity fund to provide financial aid for those who suffer serious side effects from the shots.

In addition, the Executive Council approved amendments to regulations to allow a mandatory quarantine of up to four weeks for inbound travelers, up from the 14 days currently required.

Beginning today, returnees from the United Kingdom are required to be isolated at designated hotels for three weeks, in light of a more contagious coronavirus variant that has surfaced there.

All flights from the UK to the city have already been banned.

However, the mutated virus reported in the UK may have already landed in Hong Kong, as two students returning from the country earlier this month were found to have contracted the strain after a preliminary laboratory analysis of 11 UK-imported patients’ samples.

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One of the students is a 14-year-old boy who flew back with three others on Dec 7 and is still hospitalized; the other is a 17-year-old boy who returned on Dec 13 alone and was discharged from a hospital after treatment, said Chuang Shuk-kwan of the Centre for Health Protection at a daily briefing.

Although the 53 new cases on Wednesday marked the lowest daily caseload since Nov 21, there were 20 unlinked infections among the 47 local cases. There were 13 untraceable ones on Tuesday.

“The percentage of untraced local cases remains high. Each of such cases can lead to cluster infections or even outbreaks. People should be vigilant,” Chuang said.

The city’s total of confirmed infections was pushed to 8,353, while more than 40 preliminarily positive cases were also recorded on Wednesday and awaited confirmation.

A 77-year-old man who had chronic diseases and died on Wednesday afternoon was the city’s 133rd coronavirus-related fatality.

Contact the writer at jefferygu@chinadailyhk.com