Non-essential HA services reduced

July 18, 2020

Hospital Authority Chief Manager (Quality & Standards) Dr Lau Ka-hin:

Because of the increasing demand for the services during the COVID-19 outbreak, the Hospital Authority is going to trim down non-essential and non-emergency services at hospitals in order to reduce the patient flow, reduce the chance of infection and also reserve the manpower and resources to cope with the increased demand in the services related to COVID-19. Actually, we have started this since the outbreak of COVID-19 in July. But we noted that the increase in the number (of cases) was drastic in the last week, so we have planned to reduce more of our non-essential and non-emergency services at our hospitals. It will cause some inconvenience to the public, but I hope the public will understand.

(To watch the full press briefing with sign language interpretation, click here.)

The Hospital Authority today said it will further reduce non-essential and non-emergency services at its hospitals.

The authority’s Chief Manager (Quality & Standards) Dr Lau Ka-hin made the statement at a press briefing this afternoon.

Dr Lau said: "Because of the increasing demand for the services during the COVID-19 outbreak, the Hospital Authority is going to trim down non-essential and non-emergency services at hospitals in order to reduce the patient flow, reduce the chance of infection and also reserve the manpower and resources to cope with the increased demand in the services related to COVID-19."

He explained that the authority already reduced these services this month.

"But we noted that the increase in the number of cases was drastic in the last week, so we have planned to reduce more of our non-essential and non-emergency services at our hospitals.

"It will cause some inconvenience to the public, but I hope the public will understand."