People cross a street in Hong Kong on March 24, 2022. (DALE DE LA REY / AFP)

HONG KONG - Hong Kong's new COVID-19 cases hit a one-month low with 10,405 infections on Friday, bringing the city’s tally during its fifth wave of infections to 1.09 million. 

Albert Au Ka-wing, principal medical and health officer of the Centre for Health Protection’s communicable disease branch, said in a press briefing that there were 10,401 local infections and four imported cases. 

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He said 4,578 were confirmed through nucleic acid tests and 5,827 by rapid antigen tests.

Albert Au of the Centre for Health Protection acknowledged that the rapid antigen test is less sensitive than the polymerase chain reaction test, but it is still considered an accurate tool in predicting positive COVID-19 infections

In response to a suspected fraud case concerning a self-declared positive result through an online platform, Au said random confirmatory tests are conducted every day on people who have registered their positive COVID-19 results online. 

"On average, fewer than two percent of people who underwent the confirmatory nucleic acid test returned negative results. We would launch an investigation on every such case," Au said.

These people would be sent to Penny Bay's quarantine center for further testing and observation, he said.

"A very small number of people would test negative again in the second nucleic acid test. We treat them as false-positive cases," Au said.

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He acknowledged that the rapid antigen test is less sensitive than the polymerase chain reaction test, but it is still considered an accurate tool in predicting positive COVID-19 infections.

Larry Lee Lap-yip, chief manager (Integrated Clinical Services) of the Hospital Authority, also said at the briefing that 162 patients infected with COVID-19 died in the last 24 hours. The patients comprised 85 men and 77 women aged 21 to 106 years old.

They included 86 residential care home residents while 97 were unvaccinated, Lee said.

Due to lagging in statistics, there were also 30 deaths between Feb 23 and March 23 that have not been reported earlier, Lee added.

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The number of COVID-19 patients who died in the fifth wave of pandemic in Hong Kong rose to 6,749, with the mortality rate increasing to 0.61 percent.