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Coronavirus pandemic
Hong KongHealth & Environment

Coronavirus: Hong Kong expected to retain 4-person group cap, but curbs on religious activities, contact sports to ease as 10 new cases recorded

  • Professor David Hui says construction worker’s untraceable infection means time is not right to raise limit on number of people allowed to gather in public
  • The city last surpassed single digits on September 20, when 23 cases were reported

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A group of elderly men sit across from each other behind metal barricades. Hong Kong is still trying to snuff out a third wave of Covid-19, with daily cases on a general decline. Photo: K. Y. Cheng
Zoe Low,Victor TingandLilian Cheng

Hong Kong’s four-person limit on public groups is expected to be retained when the government’s de facto cabinet reviews anti-pandemic measures on Tuesday, but larger gatherings for religious activities and contact sports will be allowed again.

The city recorded 10 new Covid-19 infections on Monday, the first double-digit increase in more than a week of improving figures, even as the global total of coronavirus-related deaths crossed the grim milestone of 1 million, according to some counts.

A source familiar with the situation told the Post that current social-distancing rules were “very unlikely” to be ditched, as local transmissions of unknown origin were still being found in the community.

However, minor tweaks were likely, including exemptions for religious gatherings and contact sports such as basketball and football, with games to be played without masks, a shift backed by at least one government public health adviser.

It is understood the Home Affairs Bureau spent weeks lobbying for changes to the rules governing sports activities as the pandemic eased locally, but the final decision will be hammered out at Tuesday’s meeting of the Executive Council, Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor’s cabinet.

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