Hong Kong Could See Over 10K Cases Next Week

Au (left) says the public needs to take safety precautions

Hong Kong is seeing a seriously large uptick in the number of Covid-19 cases -- the vast majority of them are local infections, not imported.

On August 25, the city reported 8,579 cases, including 297 imported ones.

Albert Au Ka-wing from the Centre for Health Protection warned the daily number of new infections could soon pass the 10,000 mark next week. The last time it reached 10,000 cases was on March 25 with 10,405 infections.

Police Commissioner Siu recently caught Covid

"There is a quite rapid increase in cases, indicating that the transmission in the community is increasing. There is a need for the general public to take additional precautionary measures in preventing transmission and infection," Au said.

Seems like that advice was not heeded by several senior government officials who have now caught the virus.

They include Deputy Chief Secretary Warner Cheuk Wing-hing and Commerce Secretary Algermon Yau Ying-wah, as well as immigration chief Au Ka-wang, and police commissioner Raymond Siu Chak-yee.

With the number of cases surging, infectious diseases expert Leung Chi-chiu suggested that people cut down on their social activities.

"Now there are up to 5,000 hospital beds [for Covid patients]. If we have say 14,000 cases a day and every day around 500 are admitted to hospital for eight to nine days, our beds will all be occupied," he said.

Leung says socialising needs to be cut down

So basically people are back to being shut in their homes as much as possible in the sweltering heat, unable to meet with friends and family after their mental health has taken such a toll in almost three years.

People need to have some kind of hope, that there is a light at the end of the tunnel instead of constantly implementing more and more severe social-distancing measures.

It's no wonder more and more people are packing up and leaving Hong Kong. While for some it was the national security law, others have had enough of the city's "zero-Covid" strategy that seems to yield even more cases...