Hong Kong hospitals overwhelmed by death toll amid Omicron surge
By Alexandra Stevenson
HONG KONG – Dead bodies are piling up on gurneys in hospital hallways as Hong Kong’s health system is overloaded by its biggest COVID-19 outbreak of the pandemic.
Officials said they are struggling to move the dead to the city’s public morgues quickly enough after more than 400 people died from COVID-19 last week, according to the latest official statistics. The news comes as the city is struggling to tamp down on an Omicron-fuelled outbreak, with more than 26,000 cases and 83 deaths reported Sunday (27).
The city’s hospital authority blamed transportation delays for the situation.
“That is why some bodies that were planned to be transported stayed in the hospital,” said Lau Ka-hin, the chief manager of quality and standards at Hong Kong’s hospital authority.
The city’s three public mortuaries, which can take up to 3,000 bodies, are nearly at full capacity, a top official for the Center for Health Protection said Sunday.
Public hospitals are overwhelmed as many of the sick have rushed to seek medical help in recent weeks. Over the past two weeks, Hong Kong has recorded an 821% spike in new cases, according to a New York Times database. Hospitals have run out of beds in isolation wards, leaving many patients waiting on gurneys on the street outside the hospitals.
The surge in cases is putting Hong Kong’s strict zero-COVID strategy under pressure. Mainland China has pursued a similar strategy. Chinese officials and pro-Beijing politicians in Hong Kong have been calling for more stringent measures to try to stamp out the outbreak, including a citywide lockdown.
But Hong Kong lacks the kinds of resources that mainland officials have used to lock down entire cities. Hong Kong officials said they planned to ease strict testing and isolation rules in order to help free up resources, including allowing some children who test positive to stay at home instead of separating them from their parents and hospitalizing them.
They have also appealed to the public to only go to the hospital if they have severe symptoms in order to allow more space for medical emergencies.
-New York Times