HK records 17 new Covid-19 cases

Hong Kong reported 17 new coronavirus cases on Saturday, 16 of them imported and the other classified as a possibly import-related case.

The Centre for Health Protection said the possible case was an airport ground crew staff member who lives in Grandeur Terrace in Tin Shui Wai, where there was a lockdown overnight.

The 30-year-old woman had no recent travel history.

The other imported cases recently flew in from the Philippines, the Netherlands, Australia, Singapore, France, Germany, the United States via Japan, Canada and Nepal via India.

The latest batch of patients, involving four men and 13 women, are aged between 20 to 54.

Officials also confirmed that another eight patients had come down with the highly-infectious Omicron variant, bringing the total to 95 so far in Hong Kong.

The centre also said that it was changing the classification of cases into confirmed, asymptomatic and re-positive cases in the daily press release.

It said the change had been made because it was recording an increasing number of asymptomatic and re-positive cases.