Coronavirus crisis exposes harsh existence of Hong Kong’s poorest households

Quarantine centre offers respite for man living in a ‘stacked-up cage’, families cramped in tiny subdivided flats unable to afford masks, sanitiser

Experts warn of ticking time bomb for children’s mental health as parents keep children indoors fearing contagion

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Mrs Lai says she shares a 800 sq ft flat with nine other households and does not want her children to leave the flat during the Covid-19 threat. Photo: Xiaomei Chen

Published: 9:00am, 14 Mar 2020Updated: 9:06am, 14 Mar 2020

Twice a week Mrs Lu leaves her seven-year-old twins home alone to buy food at the market in Tsuen Wan. She knows this is a criminal offence.

But the 34-year-old, who asks to remain anonymous, says she has no choice as the only carer for her sons during the coronavirus pandemic, which since February has forced the closure of schools that is set to last until after the Easter holidays next month.

Speaking to the Post inside her 120 sq ft flat, with her boys playing with Lego on a bunk bed, she says: “It is crowded in the market. I don’t want to risk them getting infected. This is the only way I can buy food.”

Mrs Lu – who lives on the fourth floor of a walk-up in Tsuen Wan, a town in Hong Kong’s New Territories – realises she is putting her children at risk.

Only last month a 4-year-old girl fell to her death from a public housing block in Tuen Mun. Her father was suspected of leaving her and his younger daughter at home for the same reason.

Ill-treatment or neglect of a child is an offence carrying a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail.