Covid Cases Continue to Rise

Some of the isolation units will be in these housing blocks

Today over 17,000 positive cases were reported, and 66 deaths.

According to Bloomberg, Hong Kong is now the second worst city in the world to be in now (the worst is Pakistan), in terms of how the place is dealing with Covid-19, its healthcare services and facilities, vaccines and so forth.

Hong Kong has plunged in the resilience score

How did the city drop so low? 

Ask Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor.

Her Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan Siu-chee continues to repeat the mantra that the fifth wave is "unprecedented" and that it hasn't peaked yet.

"We must use the coming two to three months to curb the pandemic with several measures," she said today.

As hospitals are now overstretched, any patient considered stable will be moved to isolation facilities or their homes as long as they had a negative test by the 14th day.

The only bright spot is that those who are fully vaccinated can end their isolation period if they test negative after the sixth or seventh day.

"We need to make sure resources are allocated to those who are most in need," Chan said.

You don't say!

Some temporary isolation facilities 

So many people on social media have suggested that only those who are in dire need of medical help should go to the hospital -- those who test positive but have no major symptoms should just isolate at home. But Hong Kong refuses this idea, as it continues to follow its goal of "dynamic zero Covid".

It's amusing to see government officials running around like chickens with their heads cut off.

Secretary for Housing and Transport Frank Chan Fan and his department are preparing some 3,000 flats in just completed housing estates to be temporary isolation units and described the logistics involved.

He said more than 16,000 light bulbs, 10,000 bed sheets, 3,000 electric appliances and other furniture items had to be procured, delivered and installed in all units on different levels within a short time.

They will have to keep working harder -- some 88,000 community isolation units for people with mild or no symptoms need to be ready in the next few months.

Inspection of the Lok Ma Chau Loop site

And at Lok Ma Chau Loop a temporary hospital is being built to house 816 beds. 

Hope they are building enough to house everyone! There is video footage of an unnamed hospital with patients placed in a hallway. It's devastating. Even more devastating is that so many are unvaccinated...