Analysis-Clear roadmap needed for Hong Kong’s revival as COVID sweeps through city -experts By Reuters

By Farah Master

HONG KONG (Reuters) – In just less than two months, Hong Kong went from remaining a single of the very best areas in the earth at controlling COVID-19 to just one of the worst.

Deaths have skyrocketed, the wellbeing method is swamped, morgues are overflowing and community assurance in the town authorities is at an all-time lower.

Even though the authorities sticks to a “zero-COVID” plan related to that of mainland China, town leader Carrie Lam hinted on Thursday she could ease constraints amid concerns in excess of the city’s position as a world wide economic hub.

But with bacterial infections spilling over on to the mainland and neighborhood instances hovering all-around 30,000 for each working day among a inhabitants of just 7.4 million, there needs to be a distinct exit strategy, in line with understanding to live with the virus, like other major towns, rather than making an attempt to eradicate it, overall health gurus say.

Densely populated Hong Kong has registered the most fatalities for every million folks globally in the latest weeks – additional than 24 occasions that of rival Singapore – because of to a substantial proportion of aged who ended up unvaccinated as the really transmissible Omicron variant ripped by way of care residences because February.

The tragedy could have been avoided experienced, gurus say, authorities provided incentives for vaccinations and employed healthcare means extra successfully to prepare for COVID-19, which was to start with recognized in late 2019 in the central Chinese city of Wuhan.

“The catastrophe unfolding inside of our medical center technique is predictable, preventable and political,” stated Dr David Owens, a founder of OT&P clinics and an honorary medical assistant professor in family members drugs at the University of Hong Kong.

Lam’s administration has been lambasted continuously by politicians, professional-Beijing media and on Chinese social media, just months prior to the city is thanks to maintain an election on Might 8 to choose who will direct the territory for the next 5 years.

Companies and residents are discouraged at what they see as constant combined messaging from the governing administration and measures which have closely disrupted organization and broken the economy for significantly of the earlier two yrs.

Tens of countless numbers have remaining, with web outflows exhibiting an exodus of extra than 45,000 men and women so considerably in March, compared with virtually 17,000 in December right before the fifth wave of the pandemic hit, prompting fears for Hong Kong’s for a longer period-term competitiveness.

Living WITH COVID

Lam has yet to give steering for how Hong Kong can resume some semblance of normality, inspite of everyday push briefings where she discusses facts from sewage tests to thanking mainland authorities for their assistance. The former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997.

“Hong Kong was absolutely not completely ready when we entered into the fifth wave as evidently proven, but let’s see irrespective of whether we can get superior well prepared for that eventuality of that transition to normality,” mentioned Gabriel Leung, University of Hong Kong’s dean of medication and a govt adviser on the pandemic.

Leung mentioned Hong Kong needed to make your mind up irrespective of whether it was likely to stick with its “zero-COVID” coverage, or test to are living with it as an endemic.

“We need to have to be performing all that heavy considering method now. Simply because you have to make plans appropriately.”

Even if the govt ended up to stick with zero-COVID by mass screening and extensive speak to tracing, Hong Kong would even now will need to changeover to dwelling with the virus sooner or later, the specialists reported.

About 50 % of the city’s residents have likely currently been contaminated, according to a study from the College of Hong Kong this 7 days.

Rising vaccinations to around 90% from about 80% at this time is key, while guarding the most susceptible, like people in nursing households, the industry experts reported. At the moment only 56% of people about 80 have been vaccinated.

With residents building immunity from vaccinations and bacterial infections, it is likely that foreseeable future outbreaks will be a lot less extreme, reported Dr. Siddharth Sridhar, medical assistant professor of Microbiology at the College of Hong Kong.

“So that gives us a specified diploma of flexibility in terms of opening up much more and obtaining a lot more reasonable vacation limits that what we have seen before.”

Hong Kong has executed its most draconian actions since the pandemic started in 2020.

Flights from 9 nations around the world, including the United States and Britain, are banned. Inbound travellers who test detrimental on arrival will have to stay in a resort for 14 days, a harsher rule than for an contaminated resident who requires to isolate for seven days till testing negative.

Both of those procedures have no scientific foundation and really should be lifted right away, some industry experts mentioned.

Social distancing steps, this kind of as a ban on community gatherings of extra than two folks, the closure of most venues and a curfew on cafe dining past 6 p.m., could also be progressively relaxed, explained epidemiologist Ben Cowling.

Hong Kong could aim to do what Singapore has accomplished so that just after “3 to six months, in which all those people steps have been peaceful, it is simply just up to people to take care of their own threats and there is no want for local community-extensive procedures”.