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Hong Kong third wave: as city’s hospitals overflow, officials eye transfer of recovering Covid-19 patients to community facilities

  • Holiday camp-turned-quarantine centre has been identified as the first facility to take in patients as city’s tally of infections reaches 1,713
  • All patients confirmed with the virus have so far been treated in public hospitals, where there are 1,700 first- and second-tier isolation beds

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Lei Yue Mun Park and Holiday Village, which currently serves as a quarantine site, could soon host recovering Covid-19 patients in a bid to free up Hong Kong’s public hospital beds for the more seriously ill. Photo: Martin Chan
Community facilities in Hong Kong will be used to treat Covid-19 patients in stable condition as early as this month in a bid to ease the burden at overflowing public hospitals as the city battles its third wave of pandemic infections.
A holiday camp-turned-quarantine centre has been identified as the first facility to take in patients as the city’s tally of infections reached 1,713 on Friday.

Thus far, all patients confirmed with the virus have been treated in public hospitals, where there are 1,200 first-tier isolation beds and 500 second-tier beds.

Those at a community isolation facility will be given medical equipment that will connect to a tablet computer via Bluetooth to minimise contact with medical staff. Photo: Handout
Those at a community isolation facility will be given medical equipment that will connect to a tablet computer via Bluetooth to minimise contact with medical staff. Photo: Handout

But pressure has been mounting amid a continuing local spread of the virus, with clusters of cases reported from restaurants, a hospital ward and at least one elderly care home.

There are more than 370 Covid-19 patients receiving care at 14 public hospitals.

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