Lam's Concessions Too Little, Too Late

Lam said today that people's tolerance is fading 

Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor continues to be behind the ball -- waaaaayyy behind.

Today in her daily press conference she conceded that Hong Kong residents have had enough with the government's social-distancing measures -- some of the most toughest in the world -- and perhaps it was time to review the and relax some of them.

Business leaders like Zeman pleaded with Lam

"I'm working [on] it day and night to find the optimal solution for Hong Kong," Lam said, referring to a plan for the city to reopen to the outside world. 

"The time has come, not because the number of cases has come down significantly -- they are actually now at a high-level plateau -- but I have a very strong feeling that people's tolerance is fading. I have a very good [feeling] that some of our financial institutions are losing patience about the isolated status of Hong Kong."

Really? After numerous heads of chambers of commerce, diplomats, and business leaders of multinational companies have pleaded for over two years with Lam to be more realistic about keeping borders open to keep the flow of business coming into Hong Kong, she finally realises they are leaving or have already left.

Many of them have had enough of the restrictions, that make it impossible to travel in and out of Hong Kong to do business without having to do quarantine weeks on end, flights being cancelled and social-distancing measures. And as a result a number of companies have moved or are moving to Singapore, soon to replace Hong Kong as Asia's hub.

Over 50,000 people left from March 1-15

In February 71,354 people left, a record since the start of the fifth wave in late December, while in the first half of March 50,505 people left, many of them trying to avoid the mass testing lockdown, or leaving permanently.

On top of that are local residents departing their hometowns for good, terrified of the national security law and national education, and looking to raise their families elsewhere.

So what is Lam doing to stem the flow?

As early as Sunday she will announce if the mass testing will still go ahead or not, along with the possible relaxation of quarantine requirements from 14 days to seven.

Why this sudden turn around when all along Lam has been pushing for zero-Covid?

Has Beijing finally realised that it is impossible to stamp out the virus completely and is using Hong Kong as a test case to live with the virus -- with Chinese characteristics?

Landmark shopping mall at noon yesterday

We are waiting with baited breath -- everyone from restaurant and bar owners, operators of gyms, sports coaches, beauty salons, mahjong parlours, to art and museum institutions, movie theatres, performing arts groups, and the tens of thousands of workers who have lost their jobs during this pandemic.

Hong Kong is dying and it's time for common sense and science to prevail.

Star Ferry is Drowning in Debt

How much longer can the Star Ferry continue to operate?

Another victim of the pandemic is the Star Ferry, one of the best known icons of Hong Kong which is now in dire financial straits.

Painted green and white, and chugs across Victoria Harbour between Central Tsim Sha Tsui and Wan Chai, the Star Ferry is having trouble covering employees' salaries and paying down debts, and it even projects it will still be in the red in 2047 after two years of losses totalling a whopping HK$70 million (US$8.9 million).

Passengers have dropped off since 2021

It was affected by the 2019 protests -- though there were a few nights during the occupation of Hong Kong Polytechnic University when tons of people crowded onto the Star Ferries to get across to Hong Kong Island -- and now the pandemic into its third year.

David Chow Cheuk-yin, the Star Ferry company's general manager, said in a statement on Monday that the firm had accumulated losses of more than HK$70 million over the past two years, saying ridership in the first two months of 2022 had plunged by 73 percent compared to the same period in 2019.

Last year the Star Ferry carried only 9.57 million passengers, a sharp drop of 46 percent from 17.97 million passengers in 2019.

"It is disheartening to see our iconic Star Ferry is now a company with negative equity," he said. "In view of the threats posed by the current environment, I am afraid I can't be optimistic, as much as I would love to be, for Star Ferry to survive this wave."

The company is now borrowing to pay its daily expenses, as monthly revenue isn't even enough to cover employees' salaries.

"Enormous losses have far exceeded the company's total assets. The Star Ferry has struggled with negative equity for a long time and now counts completely on loans to cover daily operating expenses," said Chow.

Central ferry pier was at Edinburgh Place

He even hinted the company may not even be able to repay its loans even after 2047.

When a company as famous as the Star Ferry is in negative equity that's tragic. Even worse the government has done nothing to save this traditional form of public transport that has made Hong Kong famous.

If anything some of the budget from the Hong Kong Tourism Board could be funnelled into keeping the Star Ferry literally afloat, as everyone associates the city with the boats crossing the harbour.

It would be an absolute travesty if the government lets this company die because no other company or tycoon would bother taking over a money-losing business.

But let's face it -- the Star Ferry already began dying its slow death back in 2006 when its pier was moved from Edinburgh Place to another 500 metres away on reclaimed land to Man Kwong Street. It used to be so convenient to cross the harbour by Star Ferry, just past the Mandarin Oriental and the Central Post Office. 

Original steamboat from the 1880s

Now it's a commitment to want to take the Star Ferry from either Central or Wan Chai -- where the pier is not close to anything at all.

How can the Star Ferry survive with the odds stacked against it, and yet it is everyone's favourite ride crossing Victoria Harbour. It is the closest people can feel to taking transport back in 1880, when Parsi cook Dorabjee Naorojee Mithaiwala acquired a steamboat to ferry his baked goods across between Kowloon and Central.

Anyone want to start crowdfunding for the Star Ferry? Or is that considered to be violating the national security law?

Covid Infections Projected Several Times Actual Reporting

A man selling rapid antigen tests on the street

In an online virtual gathering with colleagues this afternoon because we are all working from home, many said they knew people who had had Covid-19 and had not reported it to the government because the website was not up and running yet, or they had room in their homes where they could isolate.

One colleague has recovered after 10 days of isolation in her bedroom that she shares with her family. She is triple jabbed, though she had a sore throat and dry cough. Her nine-year-old daughter had a fever that lasted two days or so and tested negative on a rapid antigen test two days before my colleague did.

Newly-built isolation units for Covid-19 patients

Interestingly her husband who has not had his booster, tested negative as did the rest of the family.

Nevertheless, just anecdotally it shows that people know of friends and family who have been infected and so even though the number of cases is in the 20,000 mark (today it is 27,761, 228 deaths), the number could actually be several times that. 

Those reporting they are positive from RAT to the government are those who have no space at home to isolate at all, or need the official documentation to get sick leave from work.

Some colleagues think the number is actually five times more than what is reported, and researchers at the University of Hong Kong's faculty of medicine estimate there could be 3.6 million residents infected at some point and 4.5 million will catch it during the fifth wave; they predict the death toll could be 5,102, and current it is at 4,355.

The researchers project a significant drop in the number of daily cases towards the end of March, and the daily caseload to fall below 1,000 by the end of April, and below 100 by mid-May.

However, they have noticed an uptick in the number of people using public transport to get around from monitoring Octopus usage during this past weekend and believe this could affect their projections.

Medical personnel at AsiaWorld-Expo

"This could well portend a fundamental change in transmission dynamics that would render our assumptions inaccurate, thus underestimating the forward burden of the fifth wave," they said.

Meanwhile a day earlier, Kwok Kin-on, an associate professor at Chinese University's School of Public Health estimated about 5 million residents would be infected by June, and projected an even higher death toll at 7,000.

He predicted the number of infections would not subside into the four digits until late May, and would return to the 100 mark about a month later.

What is the government's response to the over 20,000 cases a day?

To close down beaches.

Beaches will be closed yet again due to Covid

Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor could make the announcement as early as tomorrow (Wednesday) even though she had said earlier that social-distancing measures were already tough enough.

"Too many people have gone to the beach unmasked and pictures have also shown a lot of them had ignored the ban on gatherings of more than two people," a source said.

How many people have actually gone to the beach?

Considering most Hongkongers like to stay away from the sun it couldn't have been that many... but alas now residents are being further punished and not allowed to go to the beach... what little pleasures there are left... 

Is it any wonder people are fleeing the city?

Hong Kong's Covid Death Toll Still Surges

Elderly patients have been outside overcrowded hospitals

Hong Kong logged a record 249 deaths in the past 24 hours, much higher than the start of the fifth wave.

When Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor was asked to comment, she insisted her government had "put in all the necessary effort in order to keep Hong Kong people safe".

"We have spent over one year to promote, to encourage, to coerce people to take the jab, but unfortunately, partly because of the low infection rate in the last year or so, and partly because of anxiety and worries and so on, we have not achieved a high rate of vaccination, especially amongst the elderly, particularly amongst elderly in elderly homes," she said.

Lam says govt has done its best for vaccinations

"There are a lot of things in our city that should be revisited and we should take a critical look in order to prepare us for a future public health crisis."

Sounds like someone is on the defensive.

But these deaths are on her watch. Not enough was done to get the elderly vaccinated and a lot of it had to do with misinformation and ineffective communication to the public about the benefits of getting vaccinated. The cash handouts were not used as an incentive to get vaccinated either which was infuriating to say the least.

Meanwhile Dr Lau Ka-hin, a chief manager of the Health Authority was also on the defensive, saying officials were not focused on death records, that the goal was to prevent patients with only mild symptoms from worsening and serious cases turning into fatalities.

"This is our aim in treating our patients," he said.

More seniors need to get jabbed quickly

Sing Tao reported this morning the possibility of further restricting social-distancing measures to only one per table instead of two.

Lam denied this was in the cards, but then again she has been known to flip flop. Her response: "I have to consider what society and the public can accept and won't rashly introduce new measures," she said. "But I again appeal to the public not to let their guard down. Even though the case numbers seem to have stabilised and there is a slight downward trend, it is not time to relax yet."

Indeed... but we hope there is a greater effort being made to inoculate the elderly as quickly as possible. We don't want to see another morbid record tomorrow...