The Doctor Will See You Now [Non-Fiction]

Chatper 104: The COVID Series

We're still getting new cases daily, but almost all of these cases are imports. Still get almost daily a couple of local cases, however (which makes China's claim that 'there have been no new local infections for over 24 hrs quite a hilarious claim, considering how vehemently HK locals insist HK is a separate jurisdiction and China insists HK is not; and yet the 'no new cases in China' seems to not include HK. So either China is now agreeing HK is not part of China or China is lying about their case numbers, lol.)

Our already-overloaded hospitals are seeing an influx of abroad students and those with dual citizenship from abroad (mainly Europe) flocking home because of the chaos in the west. And because it's almost guaranteed 12-16 hours on a flight will dry out mucus membranes, those arrivals freak out over their dry / sore throat and runny noses -- and rush to the hospital. Our isolation rooms are already at an all-time low as the high-risk cases have to wait for multiple negative samples before we can release them to the general cubicles (the beds for which are also already low in numbers) and the low-risk cases still have to wait for the turnover time at the lab (usually about 8-12 hours) before we can vacate their rooms.

Of course, dual citizenship citizens and students have rights to return to HK, especially given the much more out-of-control situation out in the west I can certainly sympathise with their fear, but the clinician side of me is frustrated that, just when we seem to begin to get in control of this outbreak (not to be confused with actually getting it under control, because that would mean we get no new local cases in 14 days in a row), people start a second wave of flocking in -- with the first flock being just prior to the mandatory quarantine initiation for mainlanders coming to HK. There will be further outbreaks.

And then I'm seeing on facebook and instagram these new waves of people coming back wearing electronic bracelets to facilitate mandatory home quarantine -- eating out.

I'm sorry, what the feck.

A few days ago, a local man attended a hospital with a cough, fever, and chest infection. But before he registered at A+E, he decided to dine at the hospital canteen first (because obviously an empty stomach is more important than a deadly infectious disease). He gets tested positive for nCoV. The entire canteen is closed and bleached inside and out and every single hospital worker who also went to that canteen after him is now exposed.