Hundreds in Hong Kong Quarantine Amid Outbreak

Hong Kong sent hundreds of people, including a playgroup of infants, into quarantine and locked down more residential areas as it tried to contain a coronavirus outbreak that began in a gym in the city center last week.

The number of confirmed cases linked to the outbreak has spiked to 109 since the first infection was reported on March 10 at Ursus Fitness in Sai Ying Pun, a gym popular with expatriates. About 750 close contacts of people infected have been sent to quarantine, the Health Department said at a press conference on Sunday.

Among the quarantined is playgroup of eight 11- to 18-month-old babies and their caregivers, according to parents. The measure was taken after the children attended a music playgroup last week, and a parent was later confirmed positive in connection to the gym cluster.

The city reported 24 new cases on Sunday, 10 of which are linked to the gym outbreak. Authorities ordered compulsory testing at 90 residential locations and 60 work sites, and closed seven schools, as a result of the spread, the department said.

Kylie Davies-Worley, a mother in quarantine with her 15-month-old son and husband, said that while conditions may be bearable for adults, “it’s just really not equipped for children.”

“The menu is definitely not baby appropriate -- no designated baby food at all,” said Davies-Worley. “He literally will be living on snacks for the next 10 days.”

Hospital Authority Chief Manager Dr Linda Yu said at the press conference that she needs more information on the quarantined infants before she can comment.

“The disease has an incubation period of 14 days. We need to observe for at least one more week to know if the gym cluster is under control,” the Health Department’s Dr Albert Au said at the press conference. “There are also secondary transmissions at schools and workplaces, we will closely monitor.”

Later Sunday, two residential areas in the Central and Western neighborhoods were locked down to enforce Covid testing, including buildings on Pok Fu Lam Road and the residential property Dynasty Court at the Mid-Levels. The actions followed a lockdown on Saturday night of four buildings in the Mid-Levels, which ended early Sunday with no confirmed Covid-19 cases found.

The government also said at the Sunday conference that some students and staffs at the Harbour School will be sent to government quarantine facilities after two confirmed cases and one preliminary case were found among school members.

The government’s latest moves marked an escalation of a days-old campaign that’s already resulted in hundreds of people being sent to quarantine camps, dozens of offices ordered to conduct mandatory employee testing and several of Hong Kong’s most expensive schools halting in-person classes. While the city’s had bigger flareups, no outbreak has hit so close to home for many of the city’s expats since the pandemic began.

Offices housing UBS Group AG, Chanel Hong Kong, Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd. and Standard Chartered Plc are included on the list of buildings where people are subject to compulsory testing orders.

Several banks advised staff last week to not come into offices. HSBC Holdings Plc vacated a floor of its main building Thursday after an employee tested preliminary positive, according to a memo to staff. UBS told some staff to work from home after an employee tested positive, while Goldman Sachs Group Inc. reverted to a policy of 50% of staff working from home.​

The outbreak also affected legal firms, with Allen & Overy and Herbert Smith Freehills both closing their offices after employees tested positive. Clifford Chance asked staff to work remotely out of an “abundance of caution.”

Hong Kong, which has one of the strictest quarantine regimes in the world, requires all who have had close contact with infected persons to enter mandatory isolation for a period up to two weeks.

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