Hong Kong issues isolation order for entire residential blocks for first time since Covid-19 pandemic began

Health authorities take ‘exceptional measure’ given special challenges presented in carrying out contact tracing of residents in subdivided flats

Authorities will also screen every resident in at least 20 buildings in Yau Tsim Mong in further attempt to further contain growing cluster in the area

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An old tenement building on Reclamation Street in Yau Ma Tei. Photo: Sam Tsang

Published: 11:39am, 15 Jan 2021Updated: 12:45am, 16 Jan 2021

Hong Kong authorities on Friday ordered the isolation of four old tenement blocks in one of the city’s most densely populated neighbourhoods to contain an escalating Covid-19 outbreak, taking such a drastic step for the first time since the start of the pandemic.

The isolation order effectively locks down all of 20, 22, 24 and 26 Reclamation Street, where 33 infections have been reported in the growing cluster in the Yau Tsim Mong district.

Health authorities said many subdivided flats in the old tenement buildings did not have lists of residents, making contact tracing difficult, and about 90 residents had been sent to quarantine centres with the help of police.

“Taking into consideration the special circumstances surrounding the buildings concerned, the department has no choice but to resort to this exceptional measure,” a Department of Health spokesman said.

Notices about mandatory Covid-19 are seen posted outside a building on Reclamation Street. Photo: Dickson Lee

Authorities also ordered thousands of residents in the wider neighbourhood, home to many families from the city’s ethnic minority communities, to undergo mandatory testing from Saturday.