People wearing face masks walk on a street in Hong Kong, March 5, 2022. (LO PING FAI / XINHUA)
HONG KONG – Hong Kong reported 446 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday as clusters involving four bars in Central district continued to grow.
Chuang Shuk-kwan, head of the communicable disease branch of the Centre for Health Protection, said in a news briefing that 64 of the new cases were imported, including 30 that were detected at the airport and 24 at quarantine hotels.
ALSO READ: HK logs 237 cases, tweaks rules for arrivals, flight suspensions
Chuang Shuk-kwan, head of the communicable disease branch of the Centre for Health Protection, said in a news briefing that 64 of the new cases were imported, including 30 that were detected at the airport and 24 at quarantine hotels
She said that 176 cases were confirmed through nucleic acid tests while 270 were detected by rapid antigen testing.
The new cases brought city's infection tally during the fifth wave of the pandemic to 1,202,007.
No COVID-19 patient passed away on Friday as the toll in the fifth wave stood at 9,168.
Chuang said the authorities reviewed the around 360 positive RAT test results reported on June 1 and 72 cases or 20 percent turned out to be negative.
Regarding the bar clusters in Central, Linq saw a jump in new cases in the past day with 44, bringing the total number of infections in the cluster to 65, involving 40 men and 25 women aged between 18 and 41. Bar Shuffle reported 27 new cases, taking the tally to 42.
Two new cases were reported at bar Zentral and three at Iron Fairies, bringing the total number of infected people in each cluster to 35 and 53 respectively, according to Chuang.
ALSO READ: HK probes possible 'fake' virus reports as city sees 505 cases
The authorities have recommended class suspensions until June 9 for one class at Christian and Missionary Alliance Sun Kei Primary School, HKSPC Operation Santa Claus Fanling Nursery School and the French class at Hong Kong Baptist University Affiliated School Wong Kam Fai Secondary and Primary School, after outbreaks involving three or more students were reported.