Self-tests ‘effective’ as infections drop further

Health officials on Sunday said the three-day voluntary self-testing exercise has been effective in detecting asymptomatic Covid patients in the community.

The local Omicron outbreak, meanwhile, continued to ease, with the daily caseload dropping below 2,000.

The Centre for Health Protection (CHP) reported 1,921 Covid infections in the past day, about 600 fewer than the day before.

Of the latest infections, 1,033 were reported by people who took rapid antigen tests after officials asked all Hong Kong residents to self-test for three days in a row from Friday.

The CHP’s Albert Au said health authorities have received 2,202 reports from people whose rapid tests came back positive on Friday and Saturday, and the figure may further increase.

“We’ll need to see how many cases were found after the three-day programme ends. Preliminary speaking, it’s effective as we have at least found some 2,000 cases,” he said.

“Nearly 70 percent of the 2,000 cases were asymptomatic. If they had not done the test, they would have continued to go out and had contact with other people without knowing they’re infected. The transmission chain would have continued.”

He said there is an increase in the proportion of Covid cases confirmed through rapid tests compared with PCR tests, and that people have heeded the authorities’ appeal to test themselves.

Another 65 patients infected with Covid have died, including 53 on Saturday.

One of the previously-unreported deaths was a man, 31, who had fainted at home last month.

Meanwhile, Japan Airlines and Turkish Airlines have been banned from flying in from Tokyo and Istanbul for seven days after their flights each carried three or more Covid patients.