Hong Kong is banning flights from eight countries including the U.S. and U.K. for two weeks from Jan. 8, in a drastic tightening of rules as it rushes to plug holes that have seen the highly infectious omicron Covid-19 variant break through the city’s defenses.
The bans last until Jan. 20 and also apply to flights from Australia, Canada, France, India, Pakistan and the Philippines, Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam said at a news conference on Wednesday.
The government is also enforcing social-distance restrictions, such as restricting evening dining-in at restaurants and closing places like pubs, gyms, and bathhouses, according to Lam, who warned that the virus might spread “silently” in the community. The actions are being taken in response to fears that the city’s low vaccination rate may make it particularly vulnerable to a fresh outbreak as omicron comes.
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The flight’s bans have been put into place again
The flight bans are a significant increase in travel restrictions that have already cut the city off from the rest of the world while keeping it virus-free for nearly seven months. In less than six weeks, the government had already suspended two dozen separate airline routes, causing holiday travel mayhem.
Routes flown by Hong Kong’s struggling flag carrier Cathay Pacific Airways were among the most recent to be suspended.
How did it all begin?
The tightening comes as the Asian financial hub this week reported the first local coronavirus case that officials were unable to trace to its source.
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The patient, an unvaccinated man who developed symptoms before being diagnosed, is believed to be carrying the Omicron variant that has triggered the exponential spread of Covid-19 across the globe.
Hong Kong is one of the only places in the world that has not experienced a delta outbreak of the pandemic. It has maintained a strict Covid-zero policy, designed to eliminate all traces of the virus within its borders.
The growing number of Omicron cases and a looming expansion of the vaccine mandate has enlivened the city’s stagnant immunisation rollout. While 66 percent of the city’s population has received the first injection, just 22 percent of the over-80 population have started the immunisation process.