More Beds Coming For Covid Patients: CE

Chief Executive Carrie Lam on Thursday said Queen Elizabeth Hospital will be turned into a designated Covid-19 hospital in a few days, as she announced a series of new measures to curb the outbreak that is known to have already infected more than half a million people in Hong Kong.

At a press conference, Lam said she was saddened by the deaths of more than 2,300 people infected with Covid in the Omicron outbreak, noting that most of them were elderly.

She said non-Covid patients at Queen Elizabeth Hospital will be moved to other public or private hospitals in the coming three to four days.

Around 9,000 additional beds at other public hospitals will also be reserved for Covid patients, she added.

Lam said more isolation facilities, located at the Kai Tak Cruise Terminal and seven sports centres, will in the near future be opened for elderly patients with mild symptoms but who still require medical care.

Altogether, she said these measures will add up to another 16,000 beds for Covid patients.

Asked if a universal Covid testing exercise will go ahead as planned in March, the CE said this will depend on the pandemic situation.

The government had previously said that 7.4 million residents will have to visit testing centres three times in March to have specimens taken.

Lam said the government has to carefully decide the best time for the mass testing exercise so that it can achieve the best result.

"Such a large-scale universal compulsory testing must be decided in accordance with the development of the epidemic situation. I would not ignore the reality just because I have given a date or spoken a statement," she said.

She said such an exercise could identify silent virus carriers, stop transmission chains and bring the outbreak to an end.

Furthermore, Lam said to prevent more care homes from being hit by Covid, so-called closed-loop management will be implemented for their staff.

Under the mechanism, care workers will stay at designated hotels and vehicles will be arranged to take them to and from work, so as to minimise the chance of them being infected in the community and taking the coronavirus into care homes.

Lam said authorities also aims to vaccinate all elderly residents at care homes by March 18.

To strengthen communication with the public, the CE said she will start hosting a daily press briefing to report on the government's anti-epidemic work, clarify rumours and answer reporters' questions.

She said the daily press briefing will continue until Hong Kong wins the battle against the Covid-19 outbreak.