Hong Kong

A top government advisor in Hong Kong has estimated that 2.5 million Hongkongers may have already been infected with COVID-19.

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Professor Yuen Kwok-yung has requested residents to get vaccinated and brace for future waves as ''eradication of the virus will not happen''

He also suggests city could consider easing travel restrictions, with imported cases far below that in the community.

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Hong Kong’s leader said Sunday that the government would consider lifting strict social distancing measures as new COVID-19 infections in the city continued trending downward.

“I wouldn’t promise now that there’s room for adjustment,” Chief Executive Carrie Lam said. “But following a review, we have a duty to account for the findings in this review and the direction we will take.”

“Having gone through the peak that you have seen here ... I think a responsible government should regularly and vigorously review these measures, to see whether there is room for adjustment,” Lam said.

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“The COVID situation is still severe although we have hit the peak apparently and there’s a downward trend,” said Lam. “However, from sewage surveillance, we can see there can be a possibility of rebound.”

Also read | Covid infections in Hong Kong reach record high, testing capacity to ramp up

Densely populated Hong Kong has registered the most deaths per million people globally in recent weeks.

But restrictions, including a ban on flights from nine countries such as Britain and the United States, quarantine of up to 14 days for residents returning to Hong Kong, and the closure of schools, gyms, beaches and other venues, have frustrated many.

Hong Kong is in the middle of a massive outbreak, recording over 1 million total cases in the city of 7.4 million. The city has been hit hard, with mortuaries full as they try to cope with a high number of deaths. Hong Kong has so far refrained from a strict city-wide lockdown like those that China regularly imposes to control the spread of the virus.

But new infections in the city have been declining. In early March, Hong Kong reported more than 50,000 new infections in one day. On Saturday, it recorded 16,583 new cases.

Many of the recent deaths are due to a large proportion of elderly people being caught unvaccinated after living in a relatively virus-free city for two years before the Omicron variant emerged.

With future outbreaks seen as inevitable, Hong Kong must make plans to eventually live with the virus, rather than insisting on eradicating all outbreaks, some epidemiologists say.

Mainland China, which has similar COVID policies, is also battling its worst outbreak since the virus first emerged in Wuhan in 2020.

President Xi Jinping said on Thursday that China would stick with its zero-Covid strategy but allow for a more "targeted" approach.

(With inputs from agencies)