Govt To Step Up Mandatory Testing To Battle Covid

The undersecretary for health, Chui Tak-yi, says the government will lower its threshold for mandatory testing to better fight the spread of Covid-19.

Speaking at the government's daily press conference on Tuesday, Chui said mandatory testing orders will be issued if two unlinked Covid cases are detected in the same building – down from the current four.

He said the move is aimed at identifying silent carriers as soon as possible to reduce the likelihood of transmission.

When asked if the government would consider relaxing social distancing measures now that the number of cases appears to have dropped, the undersecretary said it is too early to make a call.

"We have had a long public holiday in the past few days for Christmas. As you may have observed there had been a lot of activities going on ... so if there are new cases coming from those gatherings, they may be diagnosed one or two weeks later", he said, adding that society needs to remain vigilant over the New Year period.

His comments came as Hong Kong reported 53 new infections, 50 of which were locally acquired.

Fourteen of the cases were untraceable.

There were also more than 40 preliminary positive cases, including a nurse who works at the Hong Kong Buddhist Hospital, as well as a United Christian Hospital nurse who works at the palliative ward 2D, where a cluster of infections had been reported.

Three more residents of Fung Chak House in Choi Wan Estate also tested preliminary positive, after the government issued a mandatory testing order for the public housing block on Monday.

The compulsory test was ordered after several sewage samples taken from the block came back positive for coronavirus.

Another two chronically ill elderly Covid patients died on Tuesday, bringing the pandemic death toll in Hong Kong to 143.