Hong Kong says civil servants to work from home as much as possible as COVID spreads

HONG KONG, Jan 24 (Reuters) – Hong Kong’s government said that special work arrangements would be put in place from Tuesday to reduce the number of civil servants working in the office amid a growing spate of local COVID-19 cases.

The government said some employees would take turns not to return to the office and “work from home as much as possible”. As a result individual departments may temporarily reduce some public services, it said in a statement on Monday.

Daily cases hit an 18-month high of 140 on Sunday, as a weekend surge in infections linked to a congested public housing estate sent authorities in the Asian financial hub scrambling to rein in the virus.

Ahead of next week’s Lunar New Year holiday, Hong Kong has locked down thousands of people in the Kwai Chung estate for five days. About 35,000 face some curbs and must have daily tests, leader Carrie Lam said over the weekend after a visit.

The situation is testing Hong Kong’s “zero-Covid” strategy to eliminate the disease, with schools and gyms already shut, restaurants closing at 6 pm and many major air links severed or disrupted.

There was only a “slim chance” that city-wide restrictions could be lifted on 4 February as had been planned, Lam has said.

Last week authorities stirred outrage with an order to cull more than 2,000 hamsters in dozens of pet shops, after tracing an outbreak to a worker in a shop where 11 hamsters tested positive.

Photo – Pedestrians wear masks in Hong Kong, China. EPA-EFE/JEROME FAVRE