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Outside In | Why get vaccinated yet, when Covid-19 poses little threat in Hong Kong and we still can’t travel?
- Governments around the world, including Hong Kong’s, are still not getting together to establish protocols for how to resume safe travel
- On Covid-19 as a threat to life, the numbers tell it all, and make the draconian anti-pandemic measures in place difficult to understand or justify
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Why you can trust SCMP
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In many countries, traditional greetings tend to form around the thought of “Did you eat yet?” At present in Hong Kong – and perhaps worldwide – the greeting has morphed to “Did you get vaccinated yet?”
My answer so far has been simple: “No, and I don’t have any plans yet.” There are two sensible reasons to get vaccinated against Covid-19. The first is to save your own life. The second is to use vaccination as part of “passport” protocol to allow a resumption of safe travel. At present, in Hong Kong, neither of these reasons apply.
On Covid-19 as a threat to my life, the numbers tell it all, and make the draconian anti-pandemic measures currently in place difficult to understand or justify. In Hong Kong, we have seen just over 11,000 cases over the past year, and just over 200 deaths. The likelihood of falling victim to Covid-19 is negligible.
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Last year’s January-February flu season killed around 110 people. In 2019 (the last year for which we have comprehensive data), cancer killed around 15,000, pneumonia over 9,000, heart disease around 6,100 and strokes around 3,000. On average, around 120 a year die in traffic accidents.
On getting vaccinated so that I can start travelling again, there is – to my growing frustration – still no clear path towards safe and trusted travel – and not just because of arguments over which vaccines we should accept as part of a “vaccine passport”.
We have so far failed not because no path exists. On the contrary, organisations like The Commons Project, which is working with organisers of the Tokyo Olympics and several international airlines, have gone a long way to demonstrate how protocols involving vaccination, testing, and “track and trace” arrangements, can enable safe travel.
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