Category: March

A Hong Kong resident has written an open letter to Chief Executive Carrie Lam – and posted it across social media – which pretty much sums up most Hongkongers’ frustrations with the government’s inept and incompetent handling of the Covid19 pandemic.

“Dear Chief Executive

I am writing to express not only my dissatisfaction but also my incomprehension and, frankly, disgust at your policies for dealing with Covid in Hong Kong.

Time and time again you announce a policy, often contradictory to other, recent, announcements that fly in the face of science, medicine and the public good.

You, personally, have taken Hong Kong from zero to the world’s worst outbreak in under 30 days and this is, solely, a result of your indecisiveness and poor decision making. I find it very difficult to believe that your scientific and medical advisors have steered you into this course of action, one that flies in the face of the evidence from the rest of the world.

You have opened hair salons but closed beaches – please explain the thought process behind this to me.

You place no restrictions upon public transport, including the densely packed MTR, but a family of 3 have to sit at two separate tables in a restaurant despite living in the same apartment. How does this prevent the spread of the virus?

Arriving in Hong Kong and testing negative means that a traveller must spend 14 days, at their own expense, in a quarantine hotel (assuming that they can even get a booking) yet arriving and testing positive sees one carted off to a government paid-for facility and released after a negative test on the 6th day. Please, if you can, explain the logic of this to me.

Why do we have 9 countries on the flight ban list when their situations are less severe than that of Hong Kong? Can you explain how it is more dangerous for Hong Kong to let people come home than it is for us to be able to travel?

Can you justify to me why, as I look to travel home to the UK to see my father for what may well be the very last time, I need to be looking at an absolute minimum of 6 weeks away from my family in Hong Kong? Why the travel and cost constraints that you are imposing mean that I can’t even take them with me?

Why have you not worked harder to get the population vaccinated, particularly the elderly, whilst making those of us who have suffered restrictions on our lives? Why haven’t the consumption vouchers been linked to vaccination status?

You know the answer to these questions, we know that you know and you know that we know – so why, for the love of all that is decent, do you persist with this idiocy? If you, truly, cannot see the errors in your decision making to date then you have absolutely no business being in any position of power.

Your actions to date have seen hundreds of, preventable, deaths, thousands of people lose their jobs and livelihoods, businesses close, mental health decline across all demographics, children’s education suffers, and the diminishment of Hong Kong’s reputation as a business centre and a city of stable government. You have done more, in 18 months, to damage Hong’s people, economy and reputation than any bad actor could ever dream to do, and you are supposed to be on our side.

You must, surely, understand that zero Covid, whether ‘dynamic’ or otherwise is an impossibility? If you haven’t, by now, accepted the advice from medical professionals that this virus is never going away then you must, by implication, be deliberately choosing ignorance. If you have not, by now, accepted that we need to start living, fully, with the virus and work towards restoring Hong Kong to its former status and vibrancy then, frankly, you have no business acting as our leader.

I am sharing this letter on social media not to wallow in my own misery, mine is just one story amongst thousands, but because I want you to see this. I don’t just want to send you an email and receive an anodyne reply from a junior member of your staff.

I, very much, hope that you will find the decency to reply.”