Walk-in jabs to be reserved for those 60 or above

The government says the walk-in arrangement at Covid-19 vaccination centres will be tightened from Tuesday to cover only people aged 60 or above.

Long queues began to form at various vaccination centres recently after the government announced stricter vaccine mandates and after local Omicron cases were reported.

Civil Service Secretary Patrick Nip said on a radio programme that he was glad to see more people getting jabbed, but the government has to make the change to make things easier for the elderly.

Nip, who’s in charge of the vaccination drive in Hong Kong, noted authorities are reverting back to the initial arrangement when same-day tickets were handed out only to the elderly.

“It started off like that. But later on, vaccination centres had too much capacity since not so many people were getting the jab, we extended it to everyone eligible,” Nip said.

“Due to the recent situation, we want to make it convenient for elderly people, because some of them don’t know how to make a booking [online] and they need to walk in,” he added.

Nip added that the number of vaccination centres will increase soon, and more staff will be deployed at each centre.