Govt Urged To Allow Home Quarantine For Travellers

Government pandemic advisor Ivan Hung said on Saturday that it's high time that the government further relaxes quarantine restrictions for inbound travellers as the local pandemic situation shows more signs of easing.

Speaking to reporters after attending a radio programme, he said an estimated four million people in Hong Kong have already been infected with Omicron, creating strong natural immunity.

He added that he expects daily Covid infection figures to fall below the one hundred mark within two weeks.

Hung said home quarantine should apply to travellers who are triple-jabbed, or who’ve recovered from an infection and had previously received two doses of vaccine.

"I think that it's reasonable and feasible for them to quarantine at home for seven days, but at the same time [the traveller] needs to wear a tracer, so that he or she could be contacted straight away if tested positive," he said.

The professor added that if 90 percent of people here have received three jabs and there are no further Covid variants threatening the city, inbound travellers who test negative on arrival should be allowed to go about their normal lives the following day.

He also urged the government to consider scrapping its flight cancellation mechanism – which temporarily suspends a route when an aircraft brings in too many infected passengers – now.

"Because that doesn't really help with the current infection control measures … I think dropping the flight ban will allow the airlines to resume flights and allow the economy to resume as normal as quickly as possible."

Meanwhile, Hung said he doesn’t think it’s cost effective to conduct universal mass testing at this stage, as infections have been falling rapidly and there could be cross-infection risks when people queue to get tested.

He also said people may need a fourth jab by the end of the year, and hopefully by that time second generation vaccines that specifically target the Omicron variant will be available.