The Hospital Authority today said it will no longer use Hall 1 and 2 of the AsiaWorld-Expo (AWE) from tomorrow, while Halls 8 to 11 will remain on standby as a community treatment facility.

The authority noted that the Hong Kong Infection Control Centre of North Lantau Hospital (HKICC) has been in operation since February 26 to provide hospital-grade isolation and treatment facilities.

With the launch of the COVID-19 Vaccination Programme and the stabilised epidemic situation, it is believed that the 800 beds provided by the HKICC, together with around 1,000 beds on standby in Halls 8 to 11 of the AWE, should be able to take care of most of the COVID-19 patients with relatively stable conditions.

The authority expressed its gratitude to the central government, the Food & Health Bureau and other government departments for their strong support, as well as to the AWE for providing venues, relevant facilities and the retrofitting to meet the infection control requirements.

These enabled the set up of a community treatment facility within a short period of time to provide isolation services for about 3,500 patients so far, it noted.

It also thanked frontline and backend supporting staff from various hospital clusters for their solidarity, as well as locum doctors and nurses for their active participation as they helped increase the capacity in public hospitals to receive suspected and confirmed patients.