Expert Warns Of Rebound After Ching Ming And Easter

Government medical adviser David Hui has expressed concern that public gatherings during the upcoming Ching Ming Festival and Easter holidays will cause a rebound in Covid infections.

On an RTHK show on Tuesday, Hui said the epidemic is slowly easing, but daily infection figures remain high.

He said there is risk of a rebound if many families gather during Ching Ming next week.

“Some people in the community might have been infected, but they may not know it because they have little to no symptoms. Family gatherings during the earlier Lunar New Year also saw the same problem,” Hui said.

“If more families gather, then the risk of an outbreak is high. I think people should go tomb sweeping on separate days... and people can go on weekends too.”

Meanwhile, the Chinese University professor said a large-scale antibody blood test exercise can be conducted as this Covid wave ends, to gauge the actual amount of infections in Hong Kong.

On Monday, Chief Executive Carrie Lam said the total number of infected people in the city is probably far higher than the more than a million cases recorded by the government, and the current death rate reported by the authorities may be an overestimate.

But on another radio show on Tuesday, University of Hong Kong microbiologist Ho Pak-leung said authorities should now focus on boosting vaccination, strengthening support for public hospitals and making sure that oral antiviral Covid drugs are properly distributed.

He said focusing on scientific studies about Hong Kong’s actual Covid mortality rate would not help reduce severe cases and deaths.