“I completely understand the unhappiness and anxiety felt by many Kwai Chung Estate residents,” Lam said. “I hope they can understand decisive actions are needed to cut off the transmission chain, as this wave has come rather quickly and fiercely.”

Previously, they would only need seven days of quarantine at designated facilities, seven days of home quarantine and seven days of health observation, in addition to the same testing requirement.

Hong Kong recorded 124 new Covid-19 cases on Tuesday, the third day in a row in which the tally exceeded 100. Health authorities said 94 of the latest cases were local, while the remaining 30 were imported, including 21 crew members of a ship that arrived from India.

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Among the locally transmitted cases, six did not have a clear source of infection. More than 70 preliminary-positive cases were also reported. The city’s tally of confirmed infections stood at 13,519, with 213 related deaths.

In view of the latest situation in Hong Kong, Lam said there was little chance of lifting social-distancing curbs in the days after February 4, such as a ban on evening dine-in services and the closure of 15 types of entertainment venues, including cinemas and bars.

“But whether there is room to fine-tune the policy, that I am still tasking various bureaus and departments to assess every day,” she added.

The third and latest building to be hit with a five-day lockdown order is Ha Kwai House, where 13 cases have been detected so far. The first, Yat Kwai House, will now see its own lockdown end on Friday, rather than Wednesday as was originally planned.

A 48-year-old resident at Yat Kwai House surnamed Wan told the Post that she and her 12-year-old son started to develop symptoms such as coughing in the morning and tested positive for Covid-19.

She said many residents were sharing lifts while going to get tested and she suspected that was how she and her son contracted the virus. She said she saw a person being sent away from a mobile screening station after the resident tested positive.

“Officials have said that there was [suspected] transmission inside an MTR station … not to mention inside a lift,” the mother of three said. “If this continues, the number of cases in this block must continue to rise … It feels like there is no way out.”

Residents had repeatedly demanded the health authorities carry out door-to-door testing to avoid cross-infection, she said.

“I understand that the government has made a lot of effort to contain the outbreak, but have they ever respected our opinions?” Wan said.

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Asked about the risk of cross infection at the hard-hit housing estate, Dr Chuang Shuk-kwan of the Centre for Health Protection (CHP) said authorities had been trying to improve hygiene conditions there as much as possible.

She added that residents who tested preliminary-positive would receive a call informing them to stay at home and not go downstairs for testing.

Speaking on a radio programme, Dr Joseph Tsang Kay-yan, co-chairman of the Medical Association’s advisory committee on communicable diseases, said the lockdowns should cover a larger area, even all of Kwai Chung district, if more infections were detected.

But Lam stressed the operations must balance health needs with the government’s capacity and the disturbance to residents.

She said the city had recently ramped up testing capacity to 150,000 a day, and that neighbouring Guangdong province had offered to help.

“If we need to ask the mainland for some help, I will not resist that.”

Citing an outbreak at Tropicana Gardens in Wong Tai Sin, Lam said one patient there had failed to heed officials’ call to hand over their hamster as part of a government cull sparked by fears of animal-to-human transmission, thus missing an opportunity to halt the spread sooner.

However, the patient had bought the pet in early December, while officials had only called for hamsters purchased after December 22 to be handed over.

Health authorities also revealed that two staff members and a customer at a hair salon in Wong Tai Sin were confirmed as carrying the L452R mutation linked with the Delta variant.

Signs also emerged of the virus spreading to Tai Po, where health officials said sewage collected along Lam Kam Road, at the section from Kau Liu Ha to Ping Long Villa, tested positive for the coronavirus.

Chuang said authorities would further narrow down the areas for sewage testing, while urging residents in the area to go for voluntary testing.

Meanwhile, health officials inspected Glory Court in Tsuen Wan Garden on Tuesday night after two people living in “unit 5” on the 12th floor and the rooftop were confirmed as infected. One of the patients was an untraceable case who had not visited any high-risk areas before testing positive.

Dr Albert Au Ka-wing of the CHP said vertical transmission had likely occurred from the 12th floor to the rooftop via air from a waste pipe.

All residents living in unit 5 flats from the fourth to the 18th floor will be sent to quarantine camps, while as a precautionary measure, those living in unit 4 flats on the 16th to 18th floors, as well as the rooftop, will also be quarantined.

As of Tuesday, a total of 508 Covid-19 patients were being treated in public hospitals and other medical facilities. All are in stable condition.

Separately, about 65 per cent of 603 respondents in a phone survey conducted by the Democratic Party said Hong Kong should prepare for living with the virus, while 21 per cent of interviewees said the city should not.

The percentage of people supporting the strategy of living with the virus was up from 42 per cent recorded in a similar survey done in November last year.

The party said the government should consider reducing the quarantine period of incoming travellers or patients’ close contacts to five days, starting from March, in view of the shorter incubation period of the Omicron variant.

Additional reporting by Victor Ting and Nadia Lam