Hong Kong residents donning face masks walk on a footbridge in Central, Hong Kong, July 22, 2020. (CALVIN NG / CHINA DAILY)

HONG KONG - Hong Kong reported 111 local coronavirus cases on Thursday -- its second day of more than 100 local infections -- as the city scrambles to boost hospitalization and testing capacity in the face of its worst outbreak ever.

The seven imported cases involve persons with travel history to the Philippines, India and Japan, according to Chuang

The city also reported seven imported COVID-19 cases Thursday, said health officials at a media briefing in the afternoon.

The latest cases brought the city's infection tally to 2,250.

Out of the new local cases, more than 60 are related to previously confirmed outbreak clusters, said Chuang Shuk-kwan, head of the Centre for Health Protection's (CHP) Communicable Disease Branch.

The seven imported cases involve persons with travel history to the Philippines, India and Japan, according to Chuang.

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Currently 716 confirmed patients are hospitalized in 14 hospitals across Hong Kong, including 33 in critical condition and 14 in serious condition. The occupancy rates of negative pressure rooms and isolation beds in public hospitals are 76.9 percent and 74.6 percent respectively, Yu said.

At a press conference on Thursday morning, the Hospital Authority said it had decided to start using the community isolation facility at Lei Yue Mun Park and Holiday Village to receive suitable patients with particular clinical conditions in order to alleviate the demand for the isolation beds in public hospitals.

About 30 COVID-19 patients who are in the process of recovery will be admitted to the facility on Friday.

This is the first time since the COVID-19 outbreak in Hong Kong that a community isolation facility is used to receive mild patients.

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With agencies' inputs