New wave of COVID-19 caused 284 death: 91% without two doses of vaccines

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New wave of COVID-19 caused 284 death: 91% without two doses of vaccines

New wave of COVID-19 caused 284 death: 91% without two doses of vaccines.

On the first day of March, the number of newly confirmed cases of COVID-19 pneumonia in Hong Kong exceeded 30,000 again!

According to Hong Kong media such as the “Hong Kong Economic Times” and the Radio Television Hong Kong website, a total of 225,700 people have been infected with the COVID-19 in Hong Kong in the fifth wave of the epidemic.

In the past 24 hours, 117 people in Hong Kong died, aged between 47 and 99 years old, 63 were in residential care, 106 were elderly, 86 were not vaccinated, 15 received two doses of vaccine, and 16 received one dose of vaccine .

Hong Kong adjusts its anti-epidemic policy, still in a difficult period.

Hong Kong no longer pursues the gold standard for nucleic acid testing, and patients who are positive for rapid antigen screening do not need to undergo nucleic acid testing . This is very necessary.

Faced with the rapid rise of Omicron, it is difficult to collect and provide results in a timely manner with nucleic acid testing alone. Doing nucleic acid after antigen positive is also suspected of duplicating labor and wasting resources.

More importantly, the isolation policy has also changed. According to the news on February 27, patients with mild symptoms will be isolated at home, and it is no longer recommended to go to hospitals or centralized isolation points for isolation [1]. This is a very important change and is crucial to maintaining the operation of Hong Kong’s primary medical services.

In addition, if positive patients have been vaccinated, they can contact and isolate as long as they have two consecutive negative antigen tests after one week at the earliest [1] .

To be honest, according to the changes in Hong Kong’s testing, isolation methods and isolation time, it has been similar to the “coexistence with the virus” in many countries. These measures can give Hong Kong some relief when facing the Omicron peak in the near future, but I am afraid it will be far from “zero”.

However, in today’s Hong Kong, the road battle of “coexisting with the virus” or “clearing” can only be left to the future. The current crisis is the key.

On the last day of February, Hong Kong recorded 34,466 new COVID-19 diagnoses and 87 deaths [2], both hitting new highs. Of particular concern is the death data, which is the most lagging data, lagging hospitalizations, which in turn lag infections.

According to the statistics of the deaths in Hong Kong till February 28, correspond to infections that emerged from the Omicron outbreak a few weeks ago.

Waiting for a few weeks, now tens of thousands of new cases every day reflected in hospitalizations and deaths data, may be very scary.

Considering that so many people have been diagnosed today, Hong Kong must speed up the introduction and improvement of effective treatment drugs – including the oral drugs of Pfizer and Merck, the monoclonal antibody that is still effective against Omicron, such as Remdesivir.

Before the Omicron outbreak, after more than two years of epidemic prevention, the death toll from the COVID-19 in Hong Kong was about 400. But this wave of epidemics has killed 284 people as of February 27. The vast majority—91% of deaths—were missing two shots [3]:

New wave of COVID-19 caused 284 death: 91% without two doses of vaccines

As in the rest of the world, the mortality rate among unvaccinated older adults is very high :

New wave of COVID-19 caused 284 death: 91% without two doses of vaccines

For those over 80 years old who have not completed two doses of the vaccine, the case fatality rate reached 4.33%, and after two doses of the vaccine, it dropped to 0.27%. It is a pity that the vaccination rate of Hong Kong people over the age of 80 is less than 30%.

Entering March, the epidemic challenge Hong Kong faces will only be more severe than in February. According to news reports, Hong Kong plans to complete three rounds of nationwide nucleic acid testing in 9 days after March 17 [4].

The same news also mentioned that a “stay-at-home order” would be implemented during the national testing period to supplement the effect . If true, it would be quite different from the Hong Kong government’s previous announcement that the city would not be closed.

Is it still meaningful to do the national nucleic acid when the epidemic has already broken out? How helpful is the stay-at-home order for the national nucleic acid test? If it is expected that the stay-at-home order will eliminate the epidemic, is it sooner rather than later, why should it be tied to the national nucleic acid? With an increase of more than 30,000 a day, how much effect can it have on the epidemic if it is just a short-term stay-at-home order in conjunction with the national nucleic acid?

The Hong Kong government now has more questions than answers. In the face of a rapidly deteriorating epidemic, Hong Kong must find answers as soon as possible.

Of course, Hong Kong has gone through many twists and turns to become a first-class international city today, so if there is any city that can find a way out of the crisis under extremely difficult circumstances, Hong Kong should be one of them.

Reference:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-28/hong-kong-abandoning-key-covid-zero-measures-as-cases-explode
https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/hong-kong-mortuaries-fill-up-covid-deaths-climb-2022-02-28/
https://www.covidvaccine.gov.hk/pdf/death_analysis_en.pdf
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-28/hong-kong-eyes-mass-testing-with-lockdown-sing-tao-reports

New wave of COVID-19 caused 284 death: 91% without two doses of vaccines

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