Pedestrians walk along a footbridge in Hong Kong’s Wanchai area on Jan 17, 2022. (BERTHA WANG / AFP)

HONG KONG – Hong Kong reported seven new COVID-19 infections on Monday, including four local cases, as the government cordoned off two buildings in Cheung Sha Wan and Tai Po for overnight targeted testing operations.

In a media briefing, Chuang Shuk-kwan, head of the Centre for Health Protection’s communicable disease branch, said the new local cases included the untraceable Delta variant infection of a 23-year-old pet shop employee in Causeway Bay.

Chuang said tests showed that, so far, the patient's Delta strain did not match the other cases in the city.

Chuang Shuk-kwan, head of the Centre for Health Protection’s communicable disease branch, said that fewer than 20 persons also tested preliminarily positive for the virus

“No matches have been found. The closest case is that of the Pakistani male from the Middle East, but still, there’s a substantial difference. So, no source have been found yet,” she said.

“We have infected patients carrying both (Omicron and Delta) strains. We have one untraceable (Delta) case so far so it may mean there are two transmission chains in the community. That is why we are doing compulsory testing,” she added.

The other local cases involved a 17-year-old male student and an 11-year-old female student who are family members of another patient, and a 46-year-old foreign domestic worker. The city's tally stood at 13,048, including 453 Omicron infections.

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Chuang said that fewer than 20 persons also tested preliminarily positive for the virus.

They included nine relatives of the 43-year-old Pakistani housewife who returned to Hong Kong on Dec 20 and tested positive after her three-week quarantine.

Besides the five members of her immediate family, another family composed of four of her relatives also tested preliminarily positive for the virus. 

They included a 29-year-old male takeaway food courier in Sham Shui Po District who last went to work in early January; a 31-year-old woman; a nine-year-old boy who studied in Li Cheng Uk Government Primary School and who last went to school on Jan 14; and a one-year-old girl who developed symptoms on Jan 16.

The housewife had brought along a child when she returned to Hong Kong and they were quarantined together at the Silka Seaview Hotel Hong Kong in Yau Ma Tei.

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When their quarantine ended, she turned over the child to her four relatives, who live at Po Wah Court, 450-464 Un Chau Street, Cheung Sha Wan. Chuang added that the four may have been infected when the child was turned over to them. The child's test result was negative.

The government set up a restricted area at Po Wah Court at 7 pm on Monday for testing to find out if there were other COVID-19 cases in the building. The government expected to finish the operation by 7 am Tuesday.

At the same time, the government also set up another “restricted area” at Kui Wo House, Tai Wo Estate, Tai Po after the test result for a 23-year-old female resident was deemed indeterminate. 

She was sent to a public hospital for further tests while Kui Wo House was cordoned off for testing since the risk of infection could not be ruled out.

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Meanwhile, the Social Welfare Department announced in a statement on Monday night the implementation of the "vaccine bubble" in all residential care homes for the elderly and for persons with disabilities starting from Feb 24.

Those who work in these care homes must at least have received one vaccine shot, unless they are unfit for vaccination due to health reasons. They also have eight weeks to take their second jab.  

The government added that these care home employees are also required to undergo regular testing for the coronavirus.