Chief Executive Carrie Lam has asked mainland Chinese authorities to deploy medical staff to Hong Kong if the outbreak continues to deteriorate, Hong Kong Commercial Daily reported Wednesday.
The pro-Beijing newspaper said doctors from Shanghai and other provinces experienced at fighting the virus are “one call away” from crossing the border to “rush to Hong Kong’s rescue.”
The report cited two recent hospital blunders in Hong Kong—one involving an incident where a negative COVID-19 case was misclassified as a positive patient, and another in which doctors frantically transferred an individual who was not in fact a close contact of an infected person, but a positive case.
“In a lot of aspects, Hong Kong needs the experience and resources of the mainland in fighting the virus,” the paper said, adding that China is recognized as the “most successful country” in conquering COVID-19 and can advise Hong Kong on the building of temporary hospitals.
Hong Kong’s public health system is facing unprecedented burden since the COVID-19 infections surged at the start of July.
To date, the city has recorded 2,131 COVID-19 infections—over 830 of which are from the past two weeks alone.
A total of 113 new cases were confirmed on Wednesday, setting another record high of daily increases.
Linda Yu, a chief manager at the Hospital Authority, said during an afternoon press conference that over 70% of the negative pressure isolation beds are currently occupied.
Authorities are scrambling to relieve the burden on public hospitals as experts warn that the medical system could be on the brink of collapse should the outbreak worsen. Last Saturday, the Hospital Authority said the government plans to convert two locations—the Lei Yue Mun Park and Holiday Village and Asia World-Expo—into community quarantine centers to hold stable COVID-19 patients if needed.
The current outbreak is the most critical since January, when Hong Kong recorded its first virus cases. Experts warned that more severe restrictions—such as curfews—may be necessary to curb the escalating situation.
