A Cathay Pacific aircraft comes in to land at Hong Kong International Airport on Aug 11, 2021.
(ISAAC LAWRENCE / AFP)
HONG KONG – Hong Kong detected five new imported Omicron cases on Monday as the city banned Cathay Pacific flights from New York.
In a statement issued on Monday afternoon, the Centre for Health Protection said the infections involved three women from the UK, one from Nigeria, and a man from Italy, bringing the city’s tally of Omicron cases to 19. The five patients, aged between 26 and 27, were all fully vaccinated.
“The whole genome sequencing analysis conducted by the…Public Health Laboratory Services Branch confirmed that the five cases all carried the Variant of Concern Omicron,” the statement reads.
Since a passenger flight operated by Cathay Pacific from New York arrived in Hong Kong on Dec 19 with three passengers infected with COVID-19, the Department of Health decided to ban Cathay flights from New York from Dec 20 until Jan 2, the Centre for Health Protection said
Two of them tested positive during the "test-and-hold" arrangement upon arrival at the airport while the rest tested positive during quarantine.
The CHP added that, since a passenger flight operated by Cathay Pacific from New York arrived in Hong Kong on Dec 19 with three passengers infected with COVID-19, the Department of Health decided to ban Cathay flights from New York from Dec 20 until Jan 2.
ALSO READ: HK sees 8 new COVID-19 cases, including 7 with mutant strains
The CHP also said that Hong Kong had seven new imported COVID-19 cases on Monday, bringing the city’s tally to 12,533.
The new patients included two men and a woman from the United Kingdom, two other men and a woman from the US, and man who travelled to Poland and Germany.
The patient who returned from Poland and Germany is a 22-year-old man who lives at Block 1, Rambler Crest, 1 Tsing Yi Road, Tsing Yi.
He left Hong Kong on December 7 for Poland after he tested negative for COVID-19 on the same day. He arrived in Hong Kong on December 18 and tested positive for the virus at the airport.
As a prudent measure, the places where he resided and visited in Hong Kong during the incubation periods have been included in a compulsory testing notice, the CHP said.
READ MORE: HK logs 3 more Omicron infections, tally reaches 14
A total of 65 cases were reported from Dec 6 to 19 and all of them were imported, it added.