Vaccination to Start in March

HKers will have to wait until March for vaccinations to start

Today Hong Kong recorded 12 new coronavirus cases, though health officials said yesterday that the figures were lower these few days perhaps because doctor's offices were closed for the Lunar New Year, and also people don't like to seek medical attention during this period either.

Eu must be quarantined in case of infection

Which is why it's hard to understand why the government already announced a few days ago that restaurants could serve dinner until 10pm and with four guests per table, as well as open other venues like gyms, cinemas and theme parks IF the case numbers continue to be "low", without giving a threshold number. Why not wait two weeks after Chinese New Year to see what the situation is like then?

But hotels, restaurants, beauty parlours, spas and the above-mentioned venues are already preparing to pivot for this coming Thursday when it really is a big IF.

Of the 12 new cases is a hairdresser with RTHK and may have infected 20 people who will be sent to quarantine. One of them is prominent barrister Audrey Eu Yuet-mee, who said she interacted with the hairdresser for about five minutes who did her hair for her appearance in a show called Legco Review.

Unfortunately she was supposed to represent Apple Daily founder and tycoon Jimmy Lai Chee-ying in a 10-day trial starting Tuesday, but Eu will be replaced by another senior counsel instead. Lai is accused of participating in an illegal assembly in 2019.

Nip says all 18 districts will have jab centres

Meanwhile the Hong Kong government had said repeatedly that it would start administering vaccine injections after Chinese New Year, but now that won't happen until March.

Secretary for the Civil Service Patrick Nip Tak-kuen said the first batch of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine would arrive in Hong Kong at the end of February.

"As soon as the vaccine has arrived, we will kick-start the mechanism for appointments," he said, referring to the vaccine booking system.

He said at least 20 centres will adminster the jab in all of Hong Kong's 18 districts.

Nip said they had already done rehearsals to make sure the scheme runs safely and smoothly.

Over 700,000 have downloaded the app to use

Chief Secretary Matthew Cheung Kin-chung wrote on his blog today that the government's goal is the vaccinate most of the population by the end of the year. 

And apparently some 700,000 people have downloaded the LeaveHomeSafe app.