肺炎系列 (一百卅一) How HK kept COVID cases down

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1. Citizens
• maintaining very high standard of personal hygiene and environmental hygiene
• 97% of Hong Kong people use facemasks to prevent themselves from contracting COVID-19 [1], disregard what the HK government and WHO said.
• Hong Kong people build up face mask reserve for themselves [2].
• Painful experience in SARS in year 2003 [3], with 1755 confirmed cases (21.7% of whole world) and 299 deaths (mortality rate 17%) [3].
2. Health care workers
• maintaining high alertness, in protecting ourselves and the patients
• Health indices in Hong Kong rank among the best in the world., as evidenced by longest life expectancy of both male and female in world [4] and low maternal mortality [5-6].
• cheap public medical service for whole population [7]
• Specialists in Infectious Disease and specialists in Clinical Microbiology & Infection available
• SARS report in 2004 [8], with detail recommendations
• Centre for Health Protection is good, with detail contact tracing work [9]
• Hospital facilities
• Hospital medical and pediatrics beds utilization [10] are 80% and 30% respectively.
• As regards isolation facilities, as at noon on February 18, public hospitals were using about 937 isolation beds with an utilisation rate of about 30% [11].
3. Government
• How satisfied or dissatisfied are you with the government’s performance in handling the Coronavirus disease, also known as COVID-19?  23% satisfied, 60% dissatisfied [1].
• Did not lock down, by saying that "林鄭特首曾說「封關」不切實際 [12]、或造成歧視 [13]、已經無乜意思 [14]，陳肇始重申封關不可行 [15]，梁卓偉：香港沒必要採取封關措施 [16]。

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REFERENCES

[1] PopPanel Research Report No. 15 cumCommunity Democracy Project Research Report No. 12cum Community Health Project Research Report No. 8. Hong Kong Public Opinion Programof Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute. 2020-3-20 (Table 6)

[2] PopPanel Research Report No. 11 &Community Democracy Project Research Report No. 8. Hong Kong Public Opinion Programof Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute. 2020-2-14 (Table 10)

[3] Summary of probable SARS cases with onset of illness from 2002-11-1 to 2003-7-31. WHO

[4] 平成29年簡易生命表の概況，厚生労働省 (2017年) 其他統計 Summary of 2017 simplified life table, Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (2017) 

[5] Maternal mortality, WHO. 16-2-2018

[6] Major health indicators. Department of Health. HKSAR

[7] Hospital Authority, HKSAR
[8] Report of the Select Committee to inquire into the handling of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome outbreak by the Government and the Hospital Authority. The Legislative Council of Hong Kong. July 2004
[9] Dr. Pierre Chan. 肺炎系列 (廿六) 在香港確診個案的資料 Reported cases for Novel Coronavirus Infection in HK. 2020-1-28
[10] 肺炎系列 (八十四) 人手和病床不足，不是萬能key。2020-02-26
[11] LC Urgent Q1: Measures for tackling novel coronavirus outbreak. Press release, the government of HKSAR 2020-2-19

[12] 林鄭月娥：「封關」不切實際。Now 新聞 2020-1-25
[13] 回應全面封關建議，林鄭月娥稱或造成歧視。香港電台新聞 2020-1-31
[14] 林鄭月娥：封關「已經無乜意思」，跨境人流已降至最低。獨立媒體網 2020-2-11
[15] 陳肇始重申封關不可行，稱「武漢都已經封城，無人嚟」。獨立媒體網 2020-1-26
[16] 梁卓偉：香港沒必要採取封關措施。文匯報 2020-1-25

Dr. Pierre Chan

​Specialist in Gastroenterology and Hepatology
Legislative Councillor of HKSAR

Member, the Medical Council of Hong Kong

www.drchanpierre.org