Caught in a ‘zero COVID’ dilemma

Hong Kong is one of the last few places in the world that is still following a stringent ‘zero COVID’ policy. Ananth Krishnan reports on a populated but poorly vaccinated region that is doing all it can to keep cases at a minimum even as it becomes more and more isolated from the world

The first thing that hits is the emptiness. used to be among the world’s busiest. It handled 71.5 million passengers in 2019, which is close to 2,00,000 a day. Now, a busy day means 1,500 passengers at most. On a lean day, sometimes only half that number walks through the airport’s doors.

When a passenger steps off the plane, they can walk minutes on end without seeing another passenger. The inter-terminal train, packed to capacity in pre-pandemic times, no longer takes passengers to the arrivals hall but to what is possibly one of the world’s largest testing centres. An entire terminal has been transformed into a ‘test and hold’ facility. The departure gates have been converted into massive waiting halls. This is where passengers await their results, with tests processed at an on-site laboratory.

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