It is time for Hong Kong to adopt a “live with Covid-19” strategy, 65 percent of respondents said, according to a survey conducted by the Democratic Party this month.
A total of 603 citizens were surveyed between January 14 and 23. Among them, 25 percent and 40 percent of respondents said Hong Kong “should” and “definitely should” adopt the “live with Covid” strategy, respectively.
The data marked a 23 percent increase compared with a similar study conducted in November last year.
About 20 percent of citizens opposed the idea on the other hand.
When asked about the average number of daily confirmed cases, 30 percent of respondents said they could accept 1,000 daily cases at most, while 35 percent said they could accept a maximum of 10,000 daily cases.
In the survey conducted in November, only 17 percent and 12 percent of citizens said they could accept, at most, 1,000 and 10,000 daily cases, respectively.
The survey conducted this month also showed 67 percent of respondents agreed that apart from fines, there should be extra punishment for government officials who attended the birthday party of Witman Hung Wai-man but didn’t scan the venue’s LeaveHomeSafe QR code.
Party chairman Lo Kin-hei said most of the time citizens received information from mass media and foreign research on how the virus could affect them differently. He urged the government to release more figures and explain more clearly, like how many patients develop severe symptoms and the average length of patients’ hospital stay, so that the public could understand the seriousness of the pandemic.
He added the government could hardly convince citizens to follow the stringent social distancing measures and will need to give out more information, given that a “fully vaccinated person could still catch the coronavirus by walking pass the infected patient nine seconds apart,” referring to the female teacher’s infection at Mei Foo MTR station.
Lo added the survey results have shown the government that citizens are not happy about Hung’s 100-guest birthday party held at the peak of the fifth wave, and they expect officials who oversee the anti-pandemic work to maintain a higher moral standard.
Meanwhile, member Ramon Yuen Hoi-man said tightening social distancing measures frequently and restricting the citizens’ lives do no good for the city.
Yuen noted the survey results reflect more citizens agreement to adopt a different “live with Covid” strategy and recommended the government seriously consider the voice of the public.
