No one dares criticize Hong Kong’s Covid-19 response
This month, Hong Kong recorded one of the highest death rates in the world. Over 300,000 people are in quarantine and fears of a possible citywide lockdown has led to widespread panic-buying, causing artificial supply shortages. According to activists and exiled lawmakers, the health system is collapsing — partly as a result of an exodus of doctors and nurses in the wake of the introduction of the national security law.
Hong Kong’s healthcare system is under pressure. Not just from the unprecedented influx of patients, but also from the government itself. It has forced the city’s largest health trade union to disband under the national security law, after it went on strike in 2020.
To cope with the staff shortage, teams of more than 1,000 medical workers from mainland China have been arriving in Hong Kong on health missions. Their airport arrivals have been heavily publicized in state media as a show of unity between China and Hong Kong.
And if there’s been a failure by the authorities, no one dares to say it out loud.