'Don't Let Your Guard Down On Covid This Christmas'

Respiratory medicine specialist Leung Chi-chiu on Thursday called on people not to let their guard down as they celebrate over the Christmas holidays, to help reduce the burden on the public health system.

Leung said people should take every precaution to lessen the risk of the virus spreading to vulnerable members of the population, such as the elderly and the unvaccinated.

"The major problem is now we are still in the course of a significant rebound of Covid cases and the weather is also cold. We are seeing increasing pressure in our hospital system and we need to take care of possible hospital outbreaks as well as we have to watch closely our old age homes," he said.

Meanwhile, a school principal told an RTHK programme that students also need to take special care to avoid spreading Covid to other members of their family, or those who haven't been vaccinated.

Chu Wai-lam, the head of Fung Kai Number One primary school, said he also believes there should be no let up in daily testing for schools, given the recent high number infections each day.

"Our students and teachers are used to testing everyday. It really helps with keeping everybody in our school safe. If we want to consider next steps for relaxing social distancing measures in schools, we should wait until after the Lunar New Year," he said.

Chu warned parents that the chances of their children being infected during the school holidays are higher the normal, which could affect their return to class in the new year.