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Hong Kong joins the small, but growing, ranks of regions outside of Mainland China reporting local human-to-human transmission of the novel coronavirus with the announcement of their 15th case, the mother of a recent travel related case.
The first of 3 reports from the Hong Kong government news site (https://sc.news.gov.hk/)
A confirmed patient's mother with new pneumonia
February 2, 2020
There is one new confirmed case of new coronavirus infection in Hong Kong, with a total of 15 cases . The patient was the mother of another confirmed patient.
The 72-year-old female patient has a long-term illness. She lives in Whampoa Garden Phase 1 Tower 1, and is the mother of the 13th case. She checked in at Lei Yue Men Park Resort on February 1 for quarantine. She developed a fever and cough on the same day and was transferred to Queen Elizabeth Hospital for isolation. The patient has been transferred to Princess Margaret Hospital for further treatment today and is now in stable condition.
The CHP immediately conducted an epidemiological investigation and tracked contacts. According to the information provided by the patient, she did not travel outside during the incubation period and remained mainly at home. The patient's four household contacts, the daughter-in-law, grandchild, granddaughter and domestic helper, were still under quarantine at Lei Yue Men Park Resort, without any symptoms.
The protection center set up a hotline 2125 1122 to answer public enquiries from 8 am to 9 pm daily. As of 4pm today, the hotline has received a total of 2,647 enquiries.
The Protection Center has a special webpage that provides relevant information and health advice. It is updated online at 9 am and 6 pm daily to receive the latest information on reported cases, further improving the efficiency of issuing infection cases.
The cause of the two confirmed cases is unclear
February 2, 2020
Zhang Zhujun, director of the Department of Infectious Diseases of the Center for Health Protection of the Department of Health, said that the causes of two confirmed cases so far are not clear, and the opportunity for community infection cannot be completely ruled out.
Zhang Zhujun briefed the latest situation of the new coronavirus infection at a press conference today. He said that the 14th infection was an 80-year-old man who had a cough on January 19 and a fever on January 30. X-rays showed more shadows on his lungs when he was admitted to the hospital. It is known that his cough started to worsen on January 23, and it is believed that the date of his onset was January 23.
The patient lived with his wife in Hong Kong. He stayed in Shenzhen for several hours on January 10. During his stay in Hong Kong, he mainly walked with his wife to buy food and went to the clinic for follow-up.
He and his two daughters flew to Japan at about 9:15 in the morning on January 17 and arrived in the area at about 3:00 in the afternoon. Details of the flight are unknown. The CHP is contacting the airline to check the flight. He arrived in Tokyo on January 20 and once visited Mount Fuji. He boarded the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama on the same day, passed through Kagoshima, and arrived in Hong Kong on January 25.
Zhang Zhujun pointed out that the patient's cruise carried 2,407 tourists and 1,063 staff members, of which 130 people landed in Hong Kong on January 25, and 86 people held Hong Kong identity cards. She urged citizens of the same cruise to call the CHP hotline 2125 1122 to follow up.
She said that together with the 12th case, the cause of the illness has not been clear in two cases so far. Although the 14th case had spent several hours in the Mainland, it was not possible to determine whether he was infected in a train station in the Mainland. As he spends most of his time in Hong Kong, he cannot completely rule out opportunities for community infection.
Zhang Zhujun also mentioned that the mother of the 13th confirmed case had a fever yesterday and was sent to Queen Elizabeth Hospital for treatment. The test was initially positive for the new coronavirus, and the results need further testing. It is reported that she has not been to Wuhan and is believed to have been infected by her son.
Asked about the risk of an outbreak in Huangpu Garden where the mother and child lived, she said that in the 13th case, the ambulance was called to the hospital immediately after the onset of the disease. Authorities quickly confirmed that he had sent other family members without symptoms to the isolation camp. . Since her mother became ill in the isolation camp, it is not particularly dangerous for Huangpu Garden.
In addition to the mother of the confirmed patient, Zhang Zhujun said that another patient's initial test result was also positive, and further test results are yet to be confirmed.
The Center for Health Protection has a special webpage that provides relevant information and health advice. It is updated online at 9 am and 6 pm daily to receive the latest information on reported cases, further improving the efficiency of the distribution of infection cases.
HA urges staff to stick to their posts
February 2, 2020
Some medical staff have launched a strike. The Hospital Authority today called on employees to stay on their posts and work together to deal with the severe situation of the current peak period of service and the increasing number of new coronavirus pneumonia cases. The head office of the Hospital Authority and the major accident control centers connected to each hospital will start tomorrow.
The Hospital Authority stated that it is in line with the goals of all staff and hopes to protect the health of Hong Kong citizens. The bureau called on employees to seek consensus through consultations, not to participate in the strike, and reiterated that the strike of medical staff is not in the interests of patients and directly affects public hospital services.
The Hospital Authority today convened a central command committee to review the networked services and manpower at various hospitals. According to the information available at the moment, each hospital network needs to significantly adjust its services and concentrate on-duty staff to maintain emergency and necessary services, including handling emergency situations and other emergency clinical services such as cancer treatment and trauma services.
The network of hospitals will cut about 50% of scheduled surgery and some outpatient services. Specialist outpatient services will be affected to a certain extent, and the hospital will first follow up with stable conditions to replenish patients. On-duty medical staff will focus on providing inpatient services and treating new patients in specialist outpatient clinics.
General outpatient clinics will try to keep all outpatient clinics open to provide services by mobilizing the renewal of on-duty staff and hiring part-time staff, but will reduce the funding of incidental patients by about 25%. For patients with chronic illnesses who are in stable condition and need to be consulted, the clinic will arrange supplementary medicines in advance and postpone the follow-up date.
Each hospital will also reduce physical and occupational treatment outpatient services by about 50%, and concentrate on-duty staff to maintain inpatient services.
The Headquarters of the Hospital Authority and the major accident control center connected to each hospital will start tomorrow to closely monitor the service situation. If the service is further affected, the service arrangement will be announced in due course.
The Bureau thanked all employees who were on duty to continue on duty to coordinate with the work deployment and cope with the extra workload caused by the strike.
