Mass New Outbreak At Elderly Home Sparks Evacuation

Dozens of elderly residents in a Covid-hit care home in Tuen Mun were evacuated and put into quarantine on Wednesday as concerns rise over a major outbreak at the facility.

Health authorities on Sunday confirmed six more residents and two more staff members with coronavirus at the Cornwall Elderly’s Home, in addition to 13 preliminary positives.

Together with two more infections confirmed on Saturday, that means at least 23 people affiliated with the home are believed to have caught the disease so far.

This comes as the number of eldercare facilities being affected in the latest wave of infections continue to rise, with confirmed infections at two more homes on Sunday.

The Centre for Health Protection said a resident of the King Fuk Home for the Aged in Sham Shui Po has caught the virus. Twenty-five elderly people who lived on the same floor as the patient, along with the staff, are to be quarantined.

A caretaker who works at the Jockey Club Bradbury Wah Sum Care Centre in Fanling has also caught the virus.

The centre said seven staff members considered to be close contacts would be quarantined.

It added that the centre had been disinfected, while 42 residents and 44 staff would be tested for the virus.

Speaking on a television programme earlier in the day, the chairman of the Elderly Commission, Lam Ching-choi, said it had been a ‘miracle’ that the pandemic hadn’t affected local care homes for the elderly until the first infection was reported at a Tsz Wan Shan centre earlier this month.

Lam – who’s also an executive councillor – said there are care homes in Hong Kong are small, crowded and understaffed – making it easy for outbreaks to happen.

He added that it is very risky for some staff to work at multiple care homes as it might help the spread of the virus.

Elderly people are especially vulnerable to the coronavirus, and most of Hong Kong’s 18 Covid-related fatalities were of advanced age.