People in Hong Kong walk past a QR code for the city’s contact-tracing app at a shopping mall.
REUTERS/Lam Yik/File Photo
Hong Kong will make COVID-19 patients quarantining at home wear an electronic tracking bracelet.
The new rule will be introduced on Friday, the city’s health minister said.
Hong Kong has imposed a strict zero-COVID strategy since the start of the pandemic.
Hong Kong is making all COVID-19 patients who are under home quarantine wear a tracking bracelet to make sure they do not leave the house.
The city’s health secretary, Lo Chung-mau, told a Monday press conference that the patients will have to wear the bracelet from Friday, July 15.
Some people who test positive for COVID-19 in the city can quarantine at home, though the city also has quarantine facilities.
Hong Kong used electronic bracelets to track people earlier the pandemic.
In 2020, new arrivals had to wear tracking wristbands and quarantine for 14 days. Those were wristbands with a QR code, which people were supposed to use to check in with an app on their phones. Some people were later given wristbands that were able to track their movements.
It is not clear what kind of bracelet patients will now be given.
Hong Kong, like mainland China, has had a strict, “zero-COVID” strategy since early in the pandemic. The city’s measures have included quarantine camps for travelers and long hotel quarantines for all new arrivals, including pilots and flight crew.
Lo, who assumed his role as health secretary on July 1, has previously defended the zero-COVID strategy.
The city’s COVID-19 cases have rapidly risen in recent weeks, with more than 2,000 cases reported every day in the past week, the city’s Ming Pao newspaper reported.