Coronavirus: fourth wave could be in store for Hong Kong, but even a speedy return to normalcy would be a ‘pyrrhic victory’, expert warns

Name: World’s first coronavirus reinfection case confirmed in Hong Kong, a university study reports
Uploaded: 2020-08-29T08:50:34.000Z
Duration: 3 min 49 s
Description: World’s first coronavirus reinfection case confirmed in Hong Kong, a university study reports

Professor Yuen Kwok-yung, who advises the government on the pandemic, says infections could spike again as temperatures fall

Yuen also calls for ‘watertight’ border controls, and for people to record their own movements to facilitate contact tracing in the event of infection

Reading Time:3 minutes

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Professor Yuen Kwok-yung, a microbiologist from the University of Hong Kong, visits the Hung Hom Market earlier this month after a cluster of Covid-19 cases was reported there. Photo: Felix Wong

Kanis Leung

Published: 4:50pm, 29 Aug 2020Updated: 9:02am, 30 Aug 2020

Hong Kong could face a fourth wave of Covid-19 infections in the autumn and winter season, and while disruptions to normal life could persist for another six months to a year, even a speedy return to normalcy would merely be a “pyrrhic victory”, a leading infectious disease expert warned on Saturday.

Professor Yuen Kwok-yung, an expert from the University of Hong Kong who advises the government on the pandemic, said that although the daily number of new confirmed cases had dropped from a peak of 149 in late July to around 10 to 20 in recent days – authorities confirmed 18 new cases on Saturday – the city had already paid a heavy price in terms of the virus’ death toll and economic impacts.

Yuen said even if the pandemic completely eased after two more weeks, it could only be called a “pyrrhic victory”.

However, Yuen predicted the pandemic would worsen again in the upcoming autumn and winter because cool, dry weather eases the spread of most respiratory viruses.

“Summarising Hong Kong’s anti-epidemic experience over the last seven months can help us to prepare for the fourth wave of infections in the autumn-winter season this year,” he said on a radio programme on Saturday.

On Friday, the city recorded 13 cases, the second-lowest daily count since July 3, and another 18 on Saturday, bringing the official total to 4,786 confirmed cases, with 87 related deaths.

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World’s first coronavirus reinfection case confirmed in Hong Kong, a university study reports

Pointing to the latest wave of infections and deaths, which intensified in July, Yuen said the genetic sequence of the coronavirus showed that the strain had been imported from Southeast Asian countries, speculating that its spread through the city might have been through taxi drivers and restaurants.

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