Hong Kong vs. COVID
Hong Kong’s fifth COVID wave is threatening to overload the city’s emergency resources. But some worry that methods to temper the outbreak provide an opportunity for Beijing to increase its control over the city.
Hong Kong is “overwhelmed” by COVID, the Associated Press reports, as a recent surge in cases has strained the city’s emergency resources, with several public hospitals pushed over their operating capacities.
- Daily infections have risen by about 20 times over the past two weeks, with 1,619 reported infections on Tuesday. Last week, the city recorded its first deaths from COVID since last September.
- Medical experts warned the city could see 28,000 daily infections by the end of March, raising concerns for the large numbers of elderly people who have been reluctant to get vaccinated.
- China will offer support to help deliver food supplies, develop task forces, and build makeshift hospitals, as the city fights its fifth wave.
Authorities aren’t backing down from the city’s “dynamic zero” strategy. Chief Executive Carrie Lam (林鄭月娥 Lín Zhèng Yuè’é) has ruled out a citywide lockdown, a tactic Beijing has rolled out in various Chinese cities, but pandemic-weary Hongkongers are currently living with the city’s strictest virus containment measures since 2020.
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Many critics fear that the outbreak is an excuse for Beijing to increase control over the once-autonomous territory. “The ‘patriots only’ leaders in government and the legislature are eager to transplant what they see as the mainland approach to show how it works in Hong Kong,” said Kenneth Chan, an associate professor specializing in Hong Kong politics at Hong Kong Baptist University, per Bloomberg.
- Hong Kong’s COVID-tracking app, LeaveHomeSafe, doesn’t currently transmit real-time tracking data to the government like its sister version in the mainland. However, the outbreak has stoked fears that the government may increase surveillance of the population with more intrusive contact-tracing features, per the South China Morning Post.
- The League of Social Democrats (LSD), one of Hong Kong’s few remaining active pro-democracy parties, staged a protest against the city’s policy on Tuesday, demanding that the government “provide sufficient information about the city’s COVID-19 situation,” per HKFP.
