Coronavirus Hong Kong: tough new quarantine regime for Cathay Pacific aircrew puts flights at risk
- All pilots and cabin crew who have stopped over in Frankfurt this month to undergo 21 days’ quarantine in a government facility, airline says
- The stepped-up surveillance could jeopardise operations of the airline’s passenger and cargo flights
Authorities on Sunday also tightened monitoring of workers at the city’s main port and suggested more domestic helpers could be on their way soon, easing a long-standing shortage, given the improving pandemic situation in their home countries.
Cathay told staff in an internal memo that the Centre for Health Protection was especially concerned about aircrew from Frankfurt after three of the airline’s cargo pilots arriving from there were found to be infected with the Delta variant in less than a week.
To minimise the risk of the more infectious strain of the virus spreading into the community, all pilots and cabin crew who had stopped over in the German city at any point this month would have to undergo 21 days of quarantine in a government isolation facility, the airline said.
In addition, crew members overseas who were close contacts of the three cases should isolate for three weeks at their current location and stay out of Hong Kong for a month if they did not want to quarantine upon arrival, the memo said.
Affected crew who had already re-entered the city should expect to be contacted by health officials in the coming days, it said, adding their 21-day stint in quarantine would be measured from the day after they returned to Hong Kong.
The sole confirmed case on Sunday was a 53-year-old Cathay cargo pilot carrying the L452R mutant strain linked to the Delta variant. He arrived from Frankfurt on November 7, and his earlier status as preliminary-positive triggered an overnight screening of three towers at his residence in Tai Kok Tsui, although no additional infections were found.
Authorities last Wednesday revealed that two other Cathay cargo pilots tested positive for the Delta strain after flying from the same German city.
Cathay cargo pilot tests positive for Covid-19 in Hong Kong, lockdown ordered
The new regime for the aircrew risks throwing planes off schedule and leaving staff out of their expected positions, which could create a knock-on effect forcing the delay or even cancellation of some services.
The airline was already suffering from a shortage of crews needed to expand the number of passenger flights, particularly ones with staff affected by quarantine stays and enduring long stints away from family.
Cathay is the world’s fifth-largest cargo airline, and Hong Kong is the world’s busiest air freight hub.
Asked about possible disruptions triggered by the new measures, an airline spokesman said: “We are trying our best to maintain our cargo network as much as we can. It is very important to keep the flow of cargo between Hong Kong and the rest of the world.”
The airline had flown 14 passenger flights and seven cargo flights from Frankfurt to Hong Kong in the past two weeks, suggesting that “hundreds” of pilots and cabin crew could face quarantine, a source familiar with the situation said.
Respiratory medicine specialist Dr Leung Chi-chiu described the latest changes as “tough but necessary”, as authorities were still pursuing a “zero-infection” strategy.
“Hong Kong has gone to great lengths to convince Beijing to reopen the mainland borders, and aircrew have always been at the forefront of the city’s efforts in preventing imported cases,” he said.
Government coronavirus expert Professor David Hui Shu-cheong said authorities should “urgently” replace self-isolation privileges for aircrew members with a seven-day quarantine as a circuit-breaker measure to prevent further transmissions by the sector.
Unlike in many other parts of the world, Hong Kong has so far managed to suppress the spread of the Delta variant. Three “Delta Plus” infections have been confirmed in the past fortnight, while 348 others were found to be carrying the original Delta variant, all of them imported cases. Hong Kong has recorded 12,381 Covid-19 cases overall, with 213 related deaths.
Hong Kong may restrict aircrew movements in light of pilot Covid-19 cases
Health officials on Sunday also tightened monitoring at the city’s main port, requiring all frontline staff at the Kwai Tsing Container Terminals to undergo testing every three days if they were fully vaccinated, or daily if they were not, starting on Monday.
By the end of last month, 98 per cent of the terminals’ frontline workers were fully inoculated.
Starting on November 22, the compulsory testing arrangements will be imposed on frontline staff employed elsewhere in the ship services sector, including harbour pilots and any workers who need to board ocean-going vessels arriving in Hong Kong.
Meanwhile, Secretary for Labour and Welfare Law Chi-kwong suggested that an improving coronavirus situation in the Philippines and Indonesia and low infection rates among arriving domestic helpers from both nations could pave the way for a greater influx of such workers.
“We have been carefully adjusting the number of designated quarantine facilities for foreign domestic helpers and their check-in quotas to alleviate the city’s severe shortage of foreign domestic helpers while sticking to the general principle of preventing virus imports,” Law wrote on his official blog.
The seven-day moving average of confirmed cases in the Philippines fell from 20,915 a day in mid-September to 4,336 at the end of October, and further to 2,200 on November 10, he noted, while Indonesia recorded a seven-day moving average of 450 confirmed cases on November 10, down from a peak of 50,039 a day in mid-July.
Despite the improving pandemic situation in the two countries, they remained the top two sources of imported infections in Hong Kong over the past year, Law said.
He added that the average number of foreign domestic helpers arriving in Hong Kong rose from 28 during the first half of September to 64 during the second half. The number jumped to 107 during the first 10 days of this month.
Thomas Chan Tung-fung, chairman of the Hong Kong Union of Employment Agencies, said the daily number of arriving helpers was still too small to solve the severe shortage, and it should be increased to between 150 and 180.
“The government is using the number of quarantine rooms to limit the arrivals of the helpers. Newly arrived helpers are now competing for a quarantine room,” he said.
While there is officially no set limit on the number of arriving helpers, the limited amount of hotel rooms designated for their mandatory quarantine acts as an effective quota.
The government announced on Friday that the 500-room Courtyard by Marriott Hong Kong Sha Tin would be added as a designated isolation facility for helpers from December 8, while revealing the Silka Tsuen Wan hotel’s 409 rooms would be shifted to other quarantine purposes.
In all about 2,000 rooms will be available for arriving helpers from early December.
