Secretary for Innovation & Technology Alfred Sit today expressed gratitude to the Construction Industry Council for engaging the industry to fight COVID-19 together and supporting the LeaveHomeSafe mobile app.

Joined by the council's Executive Director Albert Cheng, Mr Sit visited construction sites in Kai Tak and Yau Tong.

He said he was pleased to see that the council has promptly responded to the Government's suggestion by appealing to its stakeholders to scan the LeaveHomeSafe venue QR codes when they enter construction sites.

The council has displayed the venue QR codes at all of its premises, while more than 1,200 construction sites have placed the QR codes at prominent positions.

Mr Sit said the local COVID-19 epidemic situation is getting severe again and the Government has adopted more stringent social distancing measures, adding that concerted efforts from the public are needed to make prevention and control work more effective.

He urged people to stay at home as far as possible. Those who need to go out should fulfil their civic responsibility and make good use of the mobile app to log records of their visits and taxi rides.

"The digital tool can keep more precise records and can replace manual information collection. This will assist in speeding up work in tracing contacts and help Hong Kong recover from the epidemic," he added.

The app has more than 380,000 downloads so far. More than 64,000 public and private venues have participated in the scheme, of which over 51,000 are private venues. The app can also be used in over 18,000 taxis.