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

The community isolation facility at Penny’s Bay will be activated tomorrow to receive low-risk COVID-19 patients.

At a press briefing today, Hospital Authority Chief Manager (Integrated Clinical Services) Dr Larry Lee explained that the authority will establish a medical post in the isolation facility to provide medical consultation services and symptom-relieving medications.

Moreover, patients will be transferred to hospitals for other medical needs if necessary.

Dr Lee said: “We aim to select COVID-19 patients who are relatively young, asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic and also without any major medical background to be sent to the Penny’s Bay community isolation facility.”

He added that this arrangement could lessen the demand on hospital isolation wards for patients with higher risks of medical care requirements, in particular the unvaccinated elderly and paediatric patients as well as those chronically ill.

The authority noted that according to the clinical experience in Hong Kong and data from around the world, low-risk patients do not require any treatment. Generally, they only need to be isolated until the virus in the body drops to a safe level. It typically takes five to 10 days for such patients to be discharged.

Meanwhile, the home quarantine arrangement will also be implemented starting tomorrow.

Centre for Health Protection Controller Dr Edwin Tsui made it clear that more COVID-19 cases are expected in the city in the coming days.

“The number of cases increased rapidly. Yesterday there were more than 300 cases and now there are more than 600 cases.

“We expect there will be more cases coming in a few days. We consider this as an after-effect of the holiday events and possible virus clusters.

“Hopefully, with all the social distancing measures in place and our current appeal to members of the public not to gather and stay home, we hope that with these measures and also our current containment measures, we can still contain the disease.”