Leading news outlet ‘deeply sorry’ over reporter’s question to Hong Kong leader about complaint mechanism for visiting mainland Chinese medical staff

Now News apologises after some in pro-Beijing camp accuse reporter of hate speech for asking how patients should file complaints over visiting medical professionals

Former chief executive Leung Chun-ying asks whether reporter was being malicious, while Hong Kong Journalists Association calls apology regrettable

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Mainland Chinese medical professionals enter AsiaWorld-Expo to treat Covid-19 patients. Photo: Jelly Tse

Published: 10:32pm, 17 Mar 2022Updated: 2:10am, 18 Mar 2022

A leading media outlet has apologised for a reporter’s question to Hong Kong’s leader about how Covid-19 patients should lodge complaints over mainland Chinese medical professionals after pro-Beijing figures and media accused the journalist of spreading hate speech.

One pro-establishment group on Thursday asked whether the reporter for Now News had breached the national security law and called for her to be sacked, reigniting fears over an erosion of press freedom in the financial hub.

At the daily briefing on the government’s pandemic response held by Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor on Wednesday, the reporter asked whether a mechanism had been established for residents to lodge complaints over the care they received from doctors, nurses and other health care professionals sent by Beijing to alleviate severe manpower shortages.

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam (centre) with health minister Sophia Chan Siu-chee (left) and the Controller of the Centre for Health Protection Dr Edwin Tsui Lok-kin (right). Photo: SCMP Pictures

Lam said a sense of gratitude should come first as “every one of them work in a medical institution in the mainland and have their patients to take care of while also having to leave their family behind”.

Patients’ complaints are handled through the Medical Council of Hong Kong, the industry’s registering body, but it does not have jurisdiction over the temporary workers, the first from the mainland to work in the city, as they were exempted from obtaining local licences under an emergency regulation introduced last month. The Hospital Authority said it bore ultimate responsibility for the mainland workers.

While the topic of the health care team’s legal liability had been broached on radio programmes and by the authority and Public Doctors’ Association earlier in the week, the question from the Now News reporter sparked a backlash among some in the pro-establishment camp.

Politihk Social Strategic launched an online petition that accused the reporter of spreading hate speech and questioning whether she breached the national security law. Under Article 29, it is a crime for anyone to provoke hatred among residents “which is likely to cause serious consequences” towards the central or local governments.