Medical staff prepare to transfer non-COVID-19 patients from Queen Elizabeth Hospital to other hospitals as Queen Elizabeth Hospital will be dedicated to treat serious COVID-19 patients, in Hong Kong, on March 9, 2022. (KIN CHEUNG / AP)

After Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor’s interview with Xinhua News Agency on Wednesday, a Hong Kong Legislative Council member and a Hong Kong deputy to the National People’s Congress urged the city to focus its efforts on controlling deaths from COVID-19 and leverage the central government’s resources to weather the fifth wave of the pandemic. 

During the interview, Lam extended her gratitude for the central government’s support in building community isolation facilities, which have greatly enhanced the local capacity. 

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Cognizant of the appalling death toll among older adults, with the median age being 80 years and particularly those with chronic conditions, Lam said the special administrative region government has heeded the suggestions of mainland medical experts to concentrate efforts on minimizing infections, severe cases and deaths in confirmed patients. 

Now it’s unrealistic to give them two jabs in such a period of time at the moment. So, the most feasible solution is to provide quality care and treatment to the elderly confirmed cases.

Zhang Xinyu, Member, Legislative Council

“Whether the old patients are at home, in an elderly care home, or already hospitalized, we need to provide them with better treatment, including both medication and personal care,” Lam said in the interview. 

Hong Kong’s death rate due to COVID-19 is the highest in the world, according to data by health publication Our World in Data. The data show Hong Kong has registered 29.18 new deaths per million over a seven-day moving average as of Monday. 

Echoing Lam’s remarks, Zhang Xinyu, a member of the Legislative Council, attributes the high COVID-19 mortality rate partly to the low vaccination rate among the older adults, many of whom have been reluctant to get the inoculation. 

“Now it’s unrealistic to give them two jabs in such a period of time at the moment. So, the most feasible solution is to provide quality care and treatment to the elderly confirmed cases. Our resources, which have been stretched, should be dedicated more to containing the virus in elderly-care homes,” Zhang said. 

Over the past few months, anti-epidemic measures and policies in the city have hardly kept up with the development of the COVID-19 situation, Zhang said. More comprehensive measures should be implemented now to eliminate the root causes of the increasing number of new cases rather than passively deal with whatever arises, he added. “For example, we should set out a straightforward triage system, sorting patients in accordance with their severity and urgency. A harder line should be taken on social distancing and work-from-home policies in no time, to nip cross-infection in the bud.” 

Lo Sui-on, a Hong Kong deputy to the NPC, also appreciates the central government’s staunch support as Hong Kong finds its back against the wall, saying that Hong Kong may not be able to survive the predicament without the help of mainland experts. While he acknowledges the SAR’s good track record in COVID-19 containment during the prior four waves of the outbreak, Lo says Hong Kong has since let its guard down and failed to get itself well equipped for the next unpredictable scenario. 

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“The fifth wave has seen our policies and measures oscillating from time to time. Although we have veteran experts offering suggestions and forecasts, their opinions are sometimes not aligned,” Lo said. “Mainland expert Liang Wannian (head of the Chinese mainland’s COVID-19 task force in Hong Kong) is an authority in anti-epidemic practice. His explicit guidance gives Hong Kong a clear direction to go.” 

The generous aid from the mainland will help Hong Kong not only get back on its feet from the pandemic, but also, in the long run, rejuvenate its economic dynamic, adds Lo, who is the director and honorary chairman of China Travel Service (Hong Kong).  

His proposals during the two sessions, which concluded on Friday, place a high premium on recovering Hong Kong’s tourism industry post-pandemic. He suggests starting with introducing enclosed tourism within the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, which encapsulates designated tourist attractions, hotels, and restaurants to ensure easy detection of COVID-19 cases and contact tracing. 

“Only if we win the fifth-wave war can we possibly recover the traveling confidence and mood,” Lo said.