Coronavirus: Hong Kong’s easing of social-distancing curbs ‘may trigger rebound in infections, but impact unlikely to be worrying’
- Further opening up will depend on number of factors, such as virus reproduction rate, daily caseloads, positive results from lockdown operations, experts say
- Decline in daily caseload expected to slow once more activities are allowed, but spike in new infections unlikely, says Professor Yuen Kwok-yung
Hong Kong’s first phase of eased social-distancing rules may trigger a rebound of Covid-19 infections, but the impact is unlikely to be “worrying” as most residents are either vaccinated or have recovered after being infected, health experts say.
But they warned that further opening up might need to be delayed if figures for a basket of indicators rose too high, including the coronavirus’ reproduction rate, positive results from overnight lockdowns and citywide sewage surveillance.
More people are expected to head out for activities as Hong Kong prepares to ease social-distancing measures in phases from Thursday, including an extension of dine-in hours for restaurants and the reopening of premises such as gyms, sports venues and cinemas.
Professor Benjamin Cowling, a public health epidemiologist at the University of Hong Kong (HKU), said he believed that while there would be a rebound in cases, the impact would not be worrying.
“I do think there will be a rebound after social-distancing measures are relaxed, because after all, the point of those measures was to suppress transmission while they were in place,” he said.
“However, I’m not worried about the rebound because I don’t think Covid-19 poses a threat to most people’s health now that we have high vaccination coverage, plus more than 60 per cent of the population have immunity from [Omicron] BA. 2 infections in the past three months.”
About 93 per cent of the city’s population have received one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, and 87 per cent have had two. While the official tally of positive cases has reached more than 1.1 million, various experts put an estimation of actual infections at somewhere between 2.5 million and 5 million.
Professor Yuen Kwok-yung from HKU, who also advises the government on the pandemic response, said the decline in daily Covid-19 cases would slow down when more activities were allowed, but a big rebound in the number of infections was unlikely.