Wishy-washy words dash hopes

Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor disappointed many when she was unable to lift international travel bans and ease social distancing as she hosted another media session yesterday.

Worse still, she wasn't even able to commit to them.

All she gave was an undertaking to "try" to make public today the outcomes of an interim review on social distancing that has been in place for a good while.

Skeptics may claim they were right not to take the government's words for granted - even if they came direct from the government head.

Didn't Lam assure us last week that she would announce the interim review as early as yesterday or as late as today?

But yesterday's undertaking to "try" was in no way a commitment.

So will Lam be able to tell the city today what the interim review has found and how these findings will lead the community to the next stage?

Even if that is the case, hopes are no longer as high as those raised the last time she voiced optimism.

But fingers crossed for now.

As the chief executive speaks today, it is probable that small steps may be taken to ease the ban on international travel from nine countries, including the United Kingdom and United States, in the wake of serious warnings raised by the business community.

The current arrangement makes little sense in requiring travelers arriving and testing negative to spend 14 days in a quarantine hotel while others arriving and testing positive are released following a negative test after a week in a government quarantine facility.

It's also true that international travelers have ceased to pose a genuine risk to Hong Kong due to the major community outbreaks of Omicron - a point noted even by the SAR's famous "Covid hunter" Yuen Kwok-yung.

In Yuen's opinion, the administration needs not wait any longer to reopen international borders to fully vaccinated travelers who have also tested negative and should allow them to isolate at home.

Perhaps these were the "certain requirements" Lam had in mind when she said yesterday that, even if the government was to lift a ban on flights from the nine countries, arrivals would still need to fulfill "certain requirements."

In contrast, Lam appeared far more cautious on the domestic front.

Saying the local situation was still stringent and pointing to evidence of a rebound in the virus detected by sewage surveillance, she succeeded in lowering public expectations.

Steps would most likely be smaller than expected if a roadmap were to be announced.

Nonetheless, it is crucial to keep moving in the right direction with the support of vaccination.

Meanwhile, the idea of issuing recovered patients some kind of proof may motivate people resistant to reporting infection to register their case via the digital platform.

That sounds well and good, but a problem with this is that it could be too idealistic to implement after so many people have recovered at home without the need to see doctors and, therefore, there is no record of their infection and recovery.

Officials should think through the matter first.