Recent news about Hong Kong is disturbing — more than one million residents have been infected by the COVID-19 virus and the death rate per million is almost the highest in the world. How could Hong Kong, Asia’s World City, log hundreds of daily COVID-19-related deaths for weeks despite timely support from the rest of the country?
The overwhelming majority of recent deaths were unvaccinated older adults. Something must be wrong in Hong Kong where its predominantly ethnic Chinese population cherishes the Confucian virtues — of respecting and caring for the aged. Leaving the elderly unprotected in the pandemic is culturally unacceptable in Chinese communities, especially when vaccines were rolled out more than a year ago. Why did our older adults shun vaccinations, were they scared? Why has New Zealand achieved over 90 percent vaccination coverage among its seniors in less than a year while the rate in Hong Kong stands below 60 percent?
It is clear to me that our hope rests in our motherland. “Ask and you shall receive” was the firm and clear message from our central government
Fake news that plays up the potential risk of vaccination, as many political leaders have noted, has proliferated and is everywhere. Misinformation propagated by some media outlets under the guise of “fact-seeking” has in fact steered right-minded citizens away from rationality. The elderly were not sufficiently informed of the high risk of being unvaccinated, they fell victim to manipulative information churned out by media outlets with despicable intentions.
It truly saddens me to hear that 70 percent of our older adults were reported to be unvaccinated last month after the vaccination program was rolled out 12 months ago, offering free jabs for every resident. As the COVID-19 death toll of unvaccinated older adults surges, we cannot sit back with arms folded to watch our senior population succumbing to the lethal attack of the virus. I urge our special administrative region government to prioritize the safety of our older adults and launch an “Elderly Lives Matter” campaign at the community level. The fact-checked statistics should be released, and the media should do their job honestly and properly. The benefits of being fully vaccinated should be widely publicized to negate scaremongering anti-vaccination misinformation. As the overall population of Hong Kong is about to be fully vaccinated, senior citizens should not be left behind. It is even more imperative now that they get vaccinated as soon as possible.
With the vaccination rate of the younger age groups exceeding 90 percent, the healthy sociable population can resume their pre-COVID lifestyle. Hence “revenge” consumption and social gatherings will appear, and economic growth will regain its strength. However, if a substantial portion of the older adults remains unvaccinated, the social-distancing restrictions cannot be lifted as they are more vulnerable to COVID-19 infections with a higher rate of developing severe symptoms than the younger age groups. A UN report showed that the tragic death rates among the COVID-19-infected older adults in Europe in 2020 were fivefold higher than that of the younger age groups.
The pandemic situation is still volatile and unpredictable; we must take whatever effective and swift actions to protect the older adults, to serve them with both medical and mental support, and to make sure that the aged citizens, especially those in the care homes, live in safe and healthy conditions.
After the inroads caused by the omicron variant, Hong Kong’s public healthcare system literally collapsed in a fortnight. People feeling unwell have waited at emergency wards for up to 16 hours, and many of them were eventually sent home with painkillers prescribed by exhausted doctors who were overstretched by the workload. The infected patients, especially the aged ones, queued up for hospital admission in makeshift shelters set up in the back alleys of hospitals.
The worsening pandemic situation in Hong Kong is so unnerving that the central government has sternly called for concerted efforts to safeguard the health and lives of Hong Kong residents. The anti-pandemic effort now must be focused on reducing casualties by treating the severe cases with sufficient medical intervention, and ensuring the effective isolation of the infected to cut off the transmission chains.
The fifth wave of COVID-19 outbreak has caused serious interruptions to social and economic activities in the city. “Work from home” means many services are now substandard. For example, post office staff only deliver mail twice a week, and some bank branches have shut down after some of their staff were infected. And the schedule of the election for the next chief executive has also had to be postponed. Some expatriates are leaving the city for safety’s sake.
It looks like Hong Kong is at the end of the rope. Fortunately, the central government has come to our rescue. It is clear to me that our hope rests in our motherland. “Ask and you shall receive” was the firm and clear message from our central government. We are so blessed to have a strong central government at our back and for being a part of China. It is clear to me that, when push comes to shove, the bondage of blood is always our reliable resort to bail our city out of desperation.
The author is a Liberal Party central committee member, a District Councilor and a former political assistant at the Education Bureau.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
