Coronavirus: don’t worry too much about pandemic, leading health official advises Hongkongers, as 3 key metrics show encouraging declines

Dr Edwin Tsui Lok-kin, the Centre for Health Protection’s controller, delivered his upbeat assessment on Wednesday, a day before authorities take the next step in easing social-distancing rules, including allowing bars to reopen for the first time since January. Karaoke lounges and nightclubs can also resume business, while restaurant dine-in service can run until midnight, and residents can go without masks at gyms and indoor sports venues.

“With social-distancing rules relaxed, we can’t rule out further outbreaks,” Tsui said. “But I would like to reiterate that we keep an eye on various indicators.”

Asked whether residents needed to rush to have their weddings and dining engagements in case a sixth wave would come soon, Tsui responded that “residents need not worry too much and can go about their lives and engagements as normal”.

Hong Kong logged 329 new Covid-19 cases, including 31 imported infections, on Wednesday, and four more deaths related to the virus. The latest figures brought the Covid-19 tally to 1,209,397, with 9,365 related fatalities.

Even with the number of cases hovering between 200 and 300 over the past week, public hospitals were only taking in between 43 and 89 Covid-19 patients a day, Tsui noted.

In another indication the pandemic was easing, between zero and three severe or critical cases were reported daily over the past week, representing 3.7 per cent of all Covid-19 inpatients being treated in hospital, compared to 6 to 7 per cent in the weeks before, he added.