The citys flailing response has exposed a crucial weakness in its ability to handle the coronavirus. The most important factor behind the gruesome death toll is low vaccination uptake among Hong Kongs elderly population. All rights reserved. Hong Kong locked down a half-dozen buildings and tested 37,000 people last month after more than 100 people there tested positive. Analysis: Hong Kong's 'zero-COVID' success now worsens strains of Omicron spike By Farah Master HONG KONG, Feb 19 (Reuters) - Hong Kong until recently had an enviable record. Authorities also launched a vaccine pass on Thursday, requiring vaccination to enter shopping malls and other premises, and it is driving some to get the shot. Anyone can read what you share. Armies of workers, deployed to lock down residents. But even pro-Beijing figures acknowledge that Hong Kong cannot copy the mainland model outright. Anyone who tests positive. First reported in South Africa, Botswana, and Hong Kong in November 2021, the Omicron variant rapidly rose to dominance worldwide and quickly displaced the Delta variant. It's an effort reminiscent of the early days of the virus when China hastily constructed two temporary hospitals in the city of Wuhan in a matter of days. Covid-19 cases in Hong Kong are spiking as the omicron variant spreads. March 18, 2022 5:30 am ET. The site of the latest outbreak, though, was not mainland China, but neighboring Hong Kong. The United Nations has declared that the world's population will pass 8 billion people on 15 November. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. When WHO was alerted on 24 November, Hong Kong was the only place outside Africa that had confirmed a case of Omicron; one person who traveled from South Africa on 11 November, and another traveler who was cross-infected by this case while staying in the same quarantine hotel. (AP Photo/Vincent Yu). Only a small proportion of the population has been infected, thanks to the Communist Partys strict zero-COVID approach of mass testing and lockdowns. After five months with no Covid deaths, Hong Kong has recorded at least 21 over the past week, including a 3-year-old girl and a 100-year-old woman on Tuesday. | Contact Us | Newsletter | Annual & Transparency Report. Police officers in protective gear standing guard in a locked-down housing estate this month. In written responses to questions, Professor Tian said the latest outbreak showed that the Hong Kong government still has some insufficiently loyal or two-faced officials, even after the security law. Unlike other places facing a surge of the Omicron variant, Hong Kong, a semiautonomous Chinese city, cannot choose to live with the virus; Beijing continues to demand local elimination. Speaking during a news conference on Friday, Dr. Theresa Tam said Canadian officials would reach out to Hong Kong authorities after reports that one of two confirmed cases of Omicron was in a. Video / NZ Herald. Hong Kong hasn't seen a locally transmitted Covid case with an unknown source for nearly three months; the last such reported case was on October 8. There were other contributing factors in this debacle. The highly transmissible omicron variant is going to be a "very difficult challenge" for Hong Kong as the city sticks to its zero-Covid policy, a former U.S. diplomat told CNBC. Regeneron says antibody therapy loses potency against omicron (12/16/21 09:43 AM EST) Covid has switched from just being a disease that may kill off portions of a firm's workforce to a useful political weapon. The increasing number of positive cases in recent months has prompted residents to scramble for goods on. Following the detection of the Omicron Covid-19 variant in Hong Kong, restrictions have been placed on the operations of restaurants, bars, schools, museums and a number of other public places. A more transmissible virus afflicting a massively undervaccinated older population led to crowds of patients thronging emergency rooms. Despite formally adhering to mainland China's zero-COVID policy, weaknesses in the Hong Kong government's pandemic policies have permitted . Commun. Hong Kongs leader, Carrie Lam, has struggled even to define the term that the government uses to describe its approach, dynamic zero., Dynamic zero I admit this is a policy requirement of the mainland, she told reporters last month. He was previously a freelance journalist at Initium, covering political and court news. Le variant Omicron ([ m i k n] [1], [2]) du SARS-CoV-2, aussi appel B.1.1.529 (synonyme BA.1) selon les lignes Pango, du clade GISAID GR/484A [3], est un variant du coronavirus responsable de la Covid-19.Nomm d'aprs la lettre grecque Omicron, le premier cas de ce variant est dtect le 9 novembre 2021 au Botswana.Le 26 novembre 2021, il est class comme variant proccupant . Hong Kong first detected the omicron variant in two flight attendants just before the new year and after months without community infections. Its severity is highly contextual. People have stood in testing lines that wind across parks and soccer fields. Despite the rain, residents line up to get tested for the coronavirus at a temporary testing center in Hong Kong Feb. 21, 2022. When the authorities this month locked down Baise, a city of about 3.6 million in southwestern China, after a flare-up of several dozen cases, they deployed 38,000 Communist Party members and workers to patrol neighborhoods and coordinate supplies, according to the local government. And the government was hesitant. But now Hong Kong is struggling in the face of Omicron. HONG KONG The scenes were straight out of Chinas coronavirus playbook. BANGKOK, Nov 7 (The Nation Thailand/ANN): A respiratory diseases expert on Monday urged people to keep getting vaccinated, warning that his hospital had seen an alarming rise in Covid-19 Omicron . A week earlier, leading microbiologist Yuen Kwok-yung said the best time to vaccinate the elderly in care homes had passed. In other nations where the omicron variant spread, people had immunity from vaccines or previous infections, and this blunted the severity of the disease. A jump in coronavirus cases overwhelmed hospitals in Hong Kong, leaving some patients waiting on sidewalks. That was the message Wednesday as Hong Kong's newly elected legislature met for the first time with lawmakers piling on Cathay Pacific after a surge in cases of the highly transmissible. Hong Kong, una vez elogiado como una historia de xito de cero covid, ahora est luchando contra un brote mortal que recuerda los primeros das de la pandemia. But unlike some other places, Hong Kong also has a high number of severe cases, overwhelming hospitals so the. And on Wednesday, a command from Xi Jinping, the countrys top leader, plastered across local front pages: Make controlling the epidemic as soon as possible an overwhelming priority.. They know that most people in Hong Kong dont trust the Chinese way of doing things.. Hong Kong has one of the highest population densities in the world, and living space is scarce. Health experts have pointed out that certain measures, such as citywide mandatory testing, would be impractical in Hong Kong, and could also stir anger in a public already deeply distrustful of the government. Stay up-to-date on the biggest health and wellness news with our weekly recap. The failure to vaccinate the most vulnerable seems to be a result of trying to please China. Health experts say the political debate has overshadowed the grim medical reality. Hong Kong, by comparison, reported more than 17,000 new cases in the latest 24-hour period and 66 deaths. Request PDF | Impacts of social distancing, rapid antigen test and vaccination on the Omicron outbreak during large temperature variations in Hong Kong: a modelling study | Background The impacts . (2 minutes) HONG KONGPeople are dying from Covid-19 in Hong Kong at a rate that surpasses most of the world's worst pandemic peaks, with almost . Hong Kong hospitals overwhelmed But how bad is Hong Kongs latest wave of infections? Omicron arrived in Hong Kong just before the new year, spread by an airline crew member who had lunch with a relative, ending months without community transmission. As a result, vaccine uptake for people 70 and older at the beginning of this year was less than 50 percent. "Omicron has been described by some as mild. Our growing numbers have a variety of implications, from health to the environment. Others have been more explicit about the political implications. Could wax worm saliva be the answer to plastic waste? But Hong Kongs situation is unique. Researchers estimate the infection toll in Hong Kong is significantly higher than official figures, likely already reaching half its 7.4 million population View gallery Deaths are shown spiking. And when the. Methods: We used a test-negative case-control design to estimate vaccine effectiveness against symptomatic disease caused by the . Many health care workers were required to isolate themselves because they got infected, exacerbating the problem. The Omicron variant (BA.1) was first detected in Hong Kong among 2 travelers in hotel quarantine in November 2021 ( 3 ), and a small community outbreak occurred in early January 2022, linked to 2 aircrew members infected overseas ( 4 ). 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CHP analysis showed that the fatality rate of fully vaccinated patients was 0.07 per cent. This study employs an age stratified mathematical model using social mobility levels as proxy estimate of social contact, taking into account: (i) the age-specific susceptibility to COVID-19 infection, (ii) the effectiveness of the two COVID-19 vaccines in Hong Kong, (iii) the mobility data during the pandemic period, (iv) the social contact data in the community during the pre-COVID period . Almost immediately after the campaign began, a steady drumbeat of vaccine misinformation began on social media. As hospitals were running out of isolation wards, hundreds of elderly patients in need of treatment were forced to stay in emergency departments, corridors or even lift lobbies. A new coronavirus subvariant called XBB.1 that was recently detected for the first time in Hong Kong has the strongest ability by far to evade vaccine protection, a leading expert has warned . Even China is battling multiple outbreaks, though they are much smaller than Hong Kongs. Peter Parks/Agence France-Presse Getty Images. She said that the Omicron variant of COVID-19 is "probably the . During the Omicron wave, Hong Kong's official covid mortality rate has been five times higher than South Korea's. These figures can be biased by differences in testing rates and judgments on . Daily cases in the city have soared, topping 6,000 on two different days this past week from around 100 about a month. It Can't Stop It, Either. The task forces will work to increase testing capacity and build makeshift isolation facilities, like the ones used in China, the government said. He claims in his post that the number of infections and deaths in Hong Kong coincides with the emergence of the BA.2.2 subvariant.The data shows that there are currently about 5,000 infections and 30 deaths per million people in Hong Kong each week. Meanwhile, the public health toll continues to grow. Hong Kong metal band Omicron never expected to share its name with a deadly infectious disease. The city was a poster child for COVID control, after going long stretches of last year without a single reported infection. It involves using public health measures such as contact tracing, mass testing, border . Locking down entire populations delays, but doesn't entirely prevent, viral transmission. As Hong Kong sinks under its worst wave yet of the coronavirus, overwhelmed hospitals have left patients waiting on sidewalks. For example, for a person who arrives at Hong Kong on 26 September 2022, the "1st day/Day 1" would be 27 September 2022, the "4th day/Day 4" would be 30 September 2022, and the "6th/Day 6" would be 2 October 2022. or redistributed. Construction teams from the mainland are rushing to build two permanent and four temporary isolation and treatment centers to handle more than 20,000 patients. Zero-COVID, also known as COVID-Zero and "Find, Test, Trace, Isolate and Support" (FTTIS), is a public health policy that has been implemented by some countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. But unlike some other places, Hong Kong also has a high number of severe cases, overwhelming hospitals so the number of deaths is soaring. The ultra-contagious nature of the omicron variant means that unless you have incredibly stringent lockdown measures, mask wearing and social distancing norms, youre not going to stem the spread, said Dr. Jimmy Whitworth, an infectious diseases expert at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Scientists believe the omicron variant is milder than the delta version of the virus. Trust in the Hong Kong and Beijing governments is quite low, he said. The fast-spreading mutation breached Hong Kongs defenses and has been spreading rapidly through one of the worlds most densely populated places, overflowing hospitals and isolation wards and prompting measures to test the entire population of 7.4 million and hastily build six isolation and treatment centers. Background: A rapid increase in coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) cases due to the omicron (B.1.1.529) variant of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 in highly vaccinated populations has aroused concerns about the effectiveness of current vaccines. Vaginal immune activity increases after having sex for the first time, A daily dose of aspirin raises the risk of falls among older people, How technology is revolutionising our understanding of ancient Egypt, How JWST could find signs of alien life in exoplanet atmospheres, IBM unveils world's largest quantum computer at 433 qubits, Herds of pig-like peccaries seem to disappear and reappear years later, Oldest legible sentence written with first alphabet is about head lice, Fish that keep their young in their mouths sometimes eat them, Slo-mo camera reveals why springtails land perfectly every time, BBC Philharmonic orchestra performs with AI for the first time. A heath worker administers a dose of COVID-19 vaccine for a recipient at a vaccination clinic in Toronto, Canada, on April 4, 2022. As a doctor who has worked in Hong Kong for more than a decade, I found this devastating to witness. Flowerless gymnosperms, such as conifer and ginkgo, ruled the Jurassic world before their flowering rivals, the angiosperms, became dominant. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. Please refresh the page and/or try again. Three subvariants of. Unvaccinated elderly citizens have accounted for a large proportion of Hong Kong's Covid-19 casualties. A small number of deaths that occurred within 14 days of vaccine administration (ruled unrelated to vaccines by investigations) were breathlessly brandished as evidence that the new vaccines were unsafe, especially for elderly people with medical conditions, who, ironically, needed them the most. The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. Carrie Lam, Hong Kongs chief executive, has struggled to definedynamic zero, the term that the Chinese government uses to describe its approach to the virus. (ZOU ZHENG / XINHUA) MOGADISHU / LAGOS / OTTAWA / LOS ANGELES - Health Canada on Thursday authorized an adapted version of the Moderna Spikevax COVID-19 vaccine that targets the Omicron BA.4/BA.5 subvariants. Shiu Sin-por, a former Hong Kong government adviser, accused Mrs. Lam of one-sidedly emphasizing the differences between Hong Kong and the mainland., He wrote in an opinion column, Hong Kongs methods are nondescript, half-baked and full of loopholes, which led to this outbreak.. Siddharth Sridhar (@sid8998) is a clinical virologist at the department of microbiology of the University of Hong Kong. Legal Statement. 60 per cent [of these cases] cannot be saved, he said, According to Hui, the low vaccination coverage among older populations in Hong Kong was the main reason behind the high death toll. Even if Hong Kongs elderly had all chosen the inactivated vaccine, the situation would not be as bad as it is now. The city's strict but successful "zero-Covid" policy had largely kept the virus out for months. low population immunity to the severe Omicron BA.2 outbreak in Hong Kong. "But now it gets worse, and so I decided to come and get vaccinated," she said. Peter Lee is a reporter for HKFP. However, this is too late for the more than 4,000 people dead, many of whom were elderly people residing in nursing homes. As the outbreak grew, Mrs. Lam at first tried to draw a clear line between Hong Kong and the mainland, even as she pledged to adhere to dynamic zero. We are now seeing a decentralization of care to nursing homes and designated community clinics. The virus has now spread to more than 20 senior homes and care facilities, highlighting another weakness in Hong Kongs preparations. Thursday recorded 986 new cases. Cases are still growing exponentially, as officials opt for targeted lockdowns rather than a citywide one. An Omicron surge has exposed the weaknesses of a system that was once a world leader in containing the coronavirus. Meanwhile, the citys public mortuaries were operating at capacity and refrigerated containers had to be set up for the temporary storage of corpses outside hospitals. Existing subscribers, please log in with your email address to link your account access. This is despite the fact that vaccines have been widely available in Hong Kong since early 2021. Despite regional neighbors abandoning most of their Covid-19 measures, many of Hong Kong's pandemic rules remain in place. What will a population of 8 billion people mean for us and the planet? Hong Kongs recent death rate has already surpassed the peak of Londons seven-day rolling average per 100,000, which occurred in April 2020, when the pandemic was still at its earliest stages and vaccinations had not yet been produced. With many people unvaccinated and vulnerable, Michal Head, a global health expert at University of Southampton, fears that it may have a "worryingly high burden of severe COVID-19 in coming weeks". All this made Hong Kong a ticking time bomb that is now exploding in slow motion. Fox News Flash top headlines for February 26. Melioidosis death tally in Hong Kong brought to nine (11-08 21:03) China's security agency buys HK$508mn Hong Kong mansion (11-08 20:00) Rename parks and playgrounds after distinguished Chinese . HKFP compares the citys latest Covid-19 statistic with three other international cities London, New York and Singapore in the hope of providing a clearer picture: The highly transmissible Omicron variant caused deaths to rise in all four cities, especially after their respective holiday seasons, but Hong Kongs recent surge in fatalities was unmatched. On Wednesday, Beijing announced that it would also assign central government officials, in addition to the regional ones, to help oversee Hong Kongs outbreak. Hand hygiene, frequent disinfection recommended by study team, while outside experts say more research needed. Between low vaccination rates among older people and the slowness to impose lockdowns, the situation is unlikely to improve any time soon, no matter what path Hong Kong adopts, said Siddharth Sridhar, a virologist at the University of Hong Kong. Check out what's clicking on Foxnews.com. But Benjamin Cowling, who studies epidemics at Hong Kong University, advised against mass testing in March since it would be hard to deal with the sheer number of confirmed cases that the approach would throw up. The local (COVID-19) transmission chain (in Hong Kong) has begun (as of 6 February 2020), . Temporary triage stations had to be erected outside hospitals, where people often had to wait long periods in cold weather for admission to inpatient facilities, which in turn were quickly overwhelmed. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung) The citys experience gives the lie to the simplistic narrative that Omicron is mild. These days, however, Hong Kong's COVID-19 defenses are in stunning collapse. Hong Kong's surge began in early January with a cluster of Omicron infections in a quarantine hotel. The woman passed the virus to her husband, who spread it to a cleaner at a vast housing development. For much of 2021, the city recorded no local cases. The sounds of animals thought to be silentuntil now, Worlds largest digital camera has same resolution as 266 iPhones, Low testosterone levels may protect women from kidney injury, COP27 climate summit will discuss reparations for affected countries. Then the omicron variant showed up. And Hong Kong has announced it will test everyone in the city next month, taking another page from the mainland playbook. Speaking during Friday mornings regular press meeting, Chief Executive Carrie Lam said the citys past measures to boost vaccinations among the elderly had been insufficient and that authorities would prioritise promoting vaccinations among elderly citizens and children. Citing internal meetings at the Hospital Authority, Hui told HKFP on Friday that the median age of deceased Covid-19 patients in Hong Kong was 85. But a record Omicron outbreak has breached Hong Kong's COVID defenses and may force the. For two years, Hong Kong successfully insulated most of its residents from COVID-19 and often went months without a single locally spread case. Mrs. Lam also rejected calls from pro-Beijing lawmakers to introduce mandatory universal testing, defending the more targeted operations. In US developments, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is considering if a fourth mRNA COVID-19 vaccine dose will be necessary. The city has reported about 150 deaths in the past three days, many among the unvaccinated elderly. For an unvaccinated person above the age of 80, the case fatality rate in Hong Kong is a whopping 12 percent. Government officials today in Hong Kong, in the middle of a worsening Omicron surge, said they would roll out mass testing in the middle of March, targeting 7.4 million residents. The city's Covid death toll is among the highest recorded at any. How did one of the worlds richest cities end up here, more than two years into the pandemic? Hong Kong is struggling to contain its most severe COVID-19 outbreak yet. "So I have to come here today even though I am worried about the side effects.". Once the variant found a way past the citys border controls in January, its high infectiousness meant that widespread transmission was a given. On Friday, she lined up for her first dose. Such networks are a longstanding part of the mainlands social controls. Omicron brutally exposed these cracks. If we give up this effective, focused testing work and rashly follow other places to conduct so-called community testing, I will not bear the consequences, she said. Courtesy of Omicron Since his old metal band broke up five years ago, guitarist Li Heng Chan. Per The New York Times, anxiety has grown among people in the city, who are worried about potential lockdowns, quarantine and other measures to combat COVID-19. Officials reported 5,906 deaths as of Mar 21 during the Omicron surge. Novavax Inc. said Tuesday a late-stage trial of its vaccine targeting the COVID variant omicron supports its continued and future use as a booster. But when the most vulnerable segment of the population remains unvaccinated and scientific facts on vaccine effectiveness are ignored, nothing is enough. Then the omicron variant showed up. 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