Press Releases

Transcript of SHWF on removal of HK from list of areas with local transmission

Following is a transcript of the remarks made by the Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food, Dr Yeoh Eng-kiong, at a stand-up media session on the removal of Hong Kong from the list of areas with local transmission today (June 23):

Dr Yeoh: I welcome the WHO (World Health Organisation) to remove Hong Kong from the list of areas with recent local transmission of SARS. I also take this opportunity to thank members of the community for rising to the challenge in unity to fight against SARS, leading to eradication of infection in Hong Kong. In particular, I also wish to thank healthcare workers who have devoted themselves so wholeheartedly and selflessly to patient services despite all the risks and work pressure, and also our colleagues in the government, other government-related organisations and non-governmental organisations in implementing comprehensive measures to combat the spread of the disease, and of course, obviously our clinicians and research experts who work round the clock to combat the disease. Obviously, the epidemic has caused much pain and suffering to many in the community. I feel very saddened by this. I would like to pay tribute to healthcare workers who were infected while taking care of patients, and those who died from the infection and patients whom we were unable to save.

Of the 23 patients still in hospitals, 10 are undergoing active SARS treatment, four are being treated for other diseases. We also have nine who are now confirmed as non-SARS cases after we have done series of tests. We have another 25 patients in convalescence and therefore we expect to see more discharges in the future.

I just also want to stress the government's unwavering commitment to safeguard public health. We will learn from experience and work together to build a better health system so that we can be better prepared ourselves should the disease return. However, I should like to emphasise that we should not lapse our guard, we should keep up with our good personal hygienic practices that we have developed during the SARS epidemic so as to prevent infectious diseases.

Reporter: Could you sum up your emotion in the past three months?

Dr Yeoh: Obviously, I think we welcome the World Health Organisation's removal of Hong Kong from the list of areas with recent local transmission. And of course it has been a very painful experience for many in the community. It has been a great cost to each and every person in Hong Kong. It has affected our social lives, our personal lives, not to mention about the health in the community and the economic cost to Hong Kong. Obviously, it has been something that I feel very much personal responsible for. I am saying that I have the job to do and responsibility to take care of the health community in Hong Kong. I will do my best to continue to do that.

Reporter: (inaudible)

Dr Yeoh: I think I just also want to clarify again today because there have been misreports that I said that SARS would not come back to Hong Kong. I just to want to say that in fact there was question asked relating whether SARS would be recurrent in the winter. My response to that was that certainly there is speculation that the SARS coronavirus may have seasonal predilection. Obviously, it is a bit early to tell whether it will or will not have a seasonal prevalence. We do not know the original source of the SARS-coronavirus. Obviously, there is research indicating that it comes from wild animals but that needs to be confirmed. As long as we do not know whether the source of the virus comes from that we have not completely eradicated it from the face of the earth, we will always have a potential of the introduction of SARS-coronavirus into Hong Kong. So, the measures that we are taking are to ensure that we have a system of surveillance which should provide early detection and prompt actions to reduce the risk of epidemic in Hong Kong. So, what we are doing, obviously, there are two main elements of this: one is to enhance our public health surveillance system to ensure that we have a comprehensive system that detects any suggestion of interaction of SARS to our public health system at an early stage and to be able to institute measures that will minimise the impact of this virus in the community.

As you know, we have set up a multi-disciplinary team during the height of the epidemic which enables us to detect whether there are environmental factors that would lead to a community outbreak. And this multi-disciplinary team has been very effective in preventing similar outbreak as in the Amoy Gardens. You remember there were cases in some of the housing estates in Hong Kong where there were clustering of cases in the vertical dimension in certain ways resembling the outbreak that we saw in Amoy Gardens. So, the multi-disciplinary team has been able to reduce the impact of this outbreak in the community.

In the hospitals, we have already reviewed our infection control facilities and the hospitals have really initiated a series of improvements including improvement in the ventilation system etc. They have also finalised a proposal to upgrade the hospital infection facilities in nine public hospitals. We hope to be able to implement these improve infection control facilities in hospitals in the next three months. And this will lead to a more than 1,000 beds in hospitals where we would have enhanced control facilities. Half of these would be single and double rooms but some of these would be four-bedded rooms. These are things that we can do in a very short timeframe. In the more medium term, we will be looking at, seeing whether we would need to build an infectious disease centres and wings to some of our existing hospitals. Those decisions will take about three months. Obviously, it is very important for the public to continue to be with very good personal hygiene habits and behaviours that we have been developing during the height of SARS epidemic. I appeal to the public to continue with these very personal hygienic practices such as washing hands before eating, making sure that they keep very good personal hygiene, wearing masks whenever they have respiratory illnesses or when taking care of individuals who have respiratory illnesses or who have fever.

Reporter: (inaudible)

Dr Yeoh: In the Toronto research, the elderly persons did not have the clinical manifestation of SARS. In Hong Kong, we have had very very painful experiences which most of the outbreaks that we have subsequently to the Prince of Wales, were related to older patients who did not present atypical symptoms in the signs of SARS as many as 25 per cent of older persons who did not present fever. So, the hospitals are truly aware of the need to look up for some of these more subtle signs of SARS. I believe that the hospitals now have good system which enables us to minimise this from occurring. Obviously, we are very concerned that we might continue to have new spread of SARS. But with our experiences in the past, I think the danger of another recurrence can be minimised. In fact, in the last few days, we have been asking the hospitals to review the cases, to see whether there were any cases that were of concern. We will also particularly look at our homes for the aged to make sure that we did not have patients that could be harbouring this virus. So, we have done all possible to ensure that we do not have another secondary outbreak. Of course, the 20-day period also give some comfort because the 20-day incubation period means that you have a period of 20 days where if something would emerge, it would have emerged. Of course, we would be very careful looking at our suspect cases to make sure that they are not SARS. So, we have done all that assuredly possible.

(Please also refer to the Chinese portion)

End/Monday, June 23, 2003
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