Hong Kong records zero local coronavirus cases for second straight day, though preliminary-positive tests loom
- Adviser warns city must be ‘extra careful’ over coming Easter holiday if it wants to break transmission chains and achieve a zero-infection rate long term
- Sunday’s case count is the lowest in five months, but officials are investigating 10 preliminary-positive tests that are likely to halt the city’s two-day streak of no local infections
Imported from Indonesia, the sole confirmed case took the total local tally to 11,446, with 205 related deaths. The last time Hong Kong reported one or fewer Covid-19 cases was on October 14 – when none were detected – after the city’s third wave of infections had subsided.
However, 10 preliminary-positive cases were identified on Sunday, including a social sciences student at Baptist University who recently attended two lectures on campus, according to a source.
The university student, who is also a youth football coach, attended a practice session last Sunday, prompting at least 10 Primary One and Primary Two team members from Pun U Association Wah Yan Primary School to be ordered into mandatory quarantine as close contacts.
The primary school said that although the practice was not organised by them, mask-wearing was in place, and three other coaches who subsequently tested negative would also be undergoing quarantine.
On Sunday, government coronavirus expert Professor David Hui Shu-cheong said the city needed to be “extra careful” as it approached a zero-infection rate, adding residents should steel their nerves a bit longer and maintain social distancing during the upcoming five-day Easter holiday.
“For the long-term good, I think we should persist a bit longer … If there are no local cases for two incubation periods of the virus [28 days], that means all transmission chains in the community have been broken,” the Chinese University respiratory medicine expert told a TV programme.