Almost half of fresh Covid-19 cases untraceable

Untraceable infections accounted for almost half of Friday’s 130 new local Covid cases, nearly double the number reported the day before.

All 59 infections with unknown origins involved the Omicron variant, with 10 cases in Sham Shui Po and the other patients coming from various parts of the city.

The Hospital Authority reported a number of infections among public hospital staff.

The controller of the Centre for Health Protection, Dr Edwin Tsui, voiced concern about the increase in unlinked cases.

“The present situation, I think, is quite challenging, because there are more and more local cases we detect every day, and those without an obvious source, the percentage has been increasing quite rapidly,” Tsui said.

“What we have to do now is to, first of all, to advise, to appeal to members of the public to reduce social gatherings, and also we have to step up our testing capacity, trying to target for those high-risk areas and pick up those cases.”

Meanwhile, more residents of Hing Ping House at Tai Hing Estate in Tuen Mun were being taken into quarantine due to virus transmission at the block.

Other people living there were told to stay home and get tested for Covid once again, with a second night of lockdown ordered.

Officials said they aimed to finish the operation at 8:30am on Saturday.

Another partial evacuation and quarantine order was also made for residents of Kwai Foon House at Kwai Chung Estate.

Earlier, some residents living in 06 flats had been moved into quarantine over virus transmissions in the block.

Officials also reported one imported Covid infection on Friday and almost 200 preliminary positive cases.