Chief Executive Carrie Lam today visited the community treatment facility at AsiaWorld-Expo and thanked the medical staff for their hard work in combating the COVID-19 epidemic.

Mrs Lam also inspected the operation of the North Lantau Hospital Hong Kong Infection Control Centre which has 816 isolation beds being put into use by phases.

She then went to Caritas Medical Centre to understand its operational arrangements during the Lunar New Year.

The Chief Executive visited two testing contractors and received briefings from their management on the provision of community testing services.

The contractors are now able to conduct a total of not less than 100,000 nucleic acid tests on average per day. The Government aims to increase the daily average testing capacity to 200,000 before mid-February to cope with any sudden surge in testing demand.

Mrs Lam noted that the community vaccination centres resumed service today and appealed to members of the public, especially the elderly, to get vaccinated as soon as possible.