131 virus cases detected

February 4, 2022

(To watch the full press briefing with sign language interpretation, click here.)

 

The Centre for Health Protection today said it is looking into 131 additional COVID-19 cases, of which 130 are locally infected.

 

Among the local cases, 59 have unknown sources of infection while 71 are linked with other cases.

 

At a press briefing this afternoon, the centre's Controller Dr Edwin Tsui said the local epidemic situation is quite worrying as the percentage of unlinked cases among the total number of cases rose from less than 10% daily in early January to about 45% today.

 

"For the present situation, I think it is quite challenging because there are more and more local cases we detected every day and for those without an obvious source, the percentage has been increasing quite rapidly.

 

"What we have to do now is, first of all, to advise, to appeal to members of the public to reduce their social gatherings and also, we have to step up our testing capacity trying to target those in high risk areas and pick up those cases.

 

"And I think by further enhancing our social distancing measures, we hope we can slow down the transmissions and buy some time for us to pick up cases in the near future."

 

More positive cases were found in Hing Ping House of Tai Hing Estate in Tuen Mun after a compulsory testing exercise was conducted yesterday. The Government decided to extend the restriction-testing declaration operation to tomorrow in order to prevent the virus from further spreading.

 

The centre's Communicable Disease Branch Head Dr Chuang Shuk-kwan noted that vertical and horizontal transmission was observed in the building and more residents need to be placed under quarantine.

 

"Previously we found some possible vertical transmission in units 20 and 21, so we removed the residents from units 20 and 21 from the bottom to the top - from the second to the 29th floor.

 

"Subsequently, we are still monitoring the situation and now we know that a total of 14 units, including some units where the residents have been quarantined and found subsequently to have confirmed cases, and then there is a total 26 residents in these 14 units.

 

"And we found there was some clustering around units 19 and 42, so we need to remove residents from these two units as well. And also, on the ninth and 10th floors, there is also some clustering, so we will remove residents of units 13 to 24 of the ninth to 10th floors, because they are on the same side of the building."

 

Dr Chuang also reported that 10 patients of the unlinked cases live in Sham Shui Po, adding the centre is checking whether the patients have known contact with one another.

 

The Government tonight made restriction-testing declarations to cover several buildings in Sham Shui Po, Block 14 of Tsui Chuk Garden in Wong Tai Sin, Tower 1 of Yuk Ming Towers in Sai Ying Pun and Blocks 1-3 and 5-9 of K. City in Kai Tak, requiring people in the restricted areas to undergo mandatory testing.

 

Meanwhile, in view of the positive test results of some sewage samples collected in Discovery Bay, the Home Affairs Department distributed about 22,000 COVID-19 rapid test kits to households, cleansing workers and property management staff in the area for voluntary testing.

 

As 26 local cases, 21 cases linked with previous cases and positive results were detected in some sewage samples collected in Sheung Shui and Yau Tong, 55 specified premises are included in the compulsory testing notice.

 

The Government will set up additional mobile specimen collection stations at the football pitch of Sun Chui Estate in Tai Wai, Po Wing Road Sports Centre in Sheung Shui and the basketball court next to Yuet Ping House of Long Ping, while the stations at Yat Tung (1) Estate in Tung Chung will continue to provide a free service for people subject to compulsory testing. The mobile station at the basketball court of Tai Po Community Centre will start operation at 8am each day.

 

For information and health advice on COVID-19, visit the Government's dedicated webpage.

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