‘The Covid-19 test made me cry’: what it’s like to get tested under Hong Kong’s mass screening scheme
- Post reporter presents first-hand experience among early birds who signed up for citywide programme
- Other volunteers interviewed generally shrug off discomfort. Swabs may be preferred by authorities and seen as more accurate than saliva test
My eyes welled with tears after the nasal swab forced itself right up my nose, triggering a sharp sensation. Tears streamed down my face.
Very few distinctive sensations – or feelings of extreme discomfort – are as unpleasant as the nasal swab, but this could only be for me, and, if one is superstitious, linked to my assigned slot number – 13.
In fact, stubbing my toe may be far less unbearable. I also had to undergo a throat swab. But the nasal one felt like water in my nose going in the wrong direction.
00:45
‘The Covid-19 test made me cry’: what it’s like to get swabbed in Hong Kong’s mass-screening scheme
I made my last-minute registration on the eve of the scheme’s launch. Before settling on my eventual test venue, I saw that the nearest testing facility at Queen’s College in Causeway Bay was full for the first four days and the earliest slot I could obtain was on September 5.