Hong Kong faces an overflowing morgue and coffin shortages due to the COVID-19 wave

Health workers in Hong Kong began storing corpses of people who died from covid-19 in refrigerated containers on Wednesday due to lack of space in the morgue due to the rapid increase in infections caused by the omicron variant.

Hong Kong has flooded its health system in recent months due to the deadly outbreak of the coronavirus and has caused a wave of deaths, especially among elderly people who have refused to be vaccinated.

Since the emergence of infectious omicron strains over the past three months, the city has recorded nearly one million infections and 4,600 deaths.

The head of the funeral department told local media that the increase in deaths has depleted the availability of the coffin.

The head of the local government, Carrie Lam, acknowledged the situation at a press conference and assured that two coffin shipments will arrive soon from mainland China.

“We will try to find a way to restore the body so that the family can organize a funeral soon.Crematorium (...) I'm also working at full capacity.” Lam said.

- Closed beach -

The ruler of the Chinese autonomous city also announced that most of the beaches were closed after photos of villagers without masks enjoying the sun and the sea caused outrage in mainland China.

This measure is in addition to strict social distancing provisions, including the use of masks when walking mountains and prohibiting the gathering of more than one person.

“With the increasing number of people on the beach, appropriate measures must be taken to reduce travel to protect the system and ensure safety,” Lam said. I said that.

Authorities said they would start closing the beach on Thursday.

Considering that the coronavirus outbreak in mainland China is due to Hong Kong's weak response to the coronavirus, numerous Chinese people have expressed outrage on social media.

The city did not impose general confinement, despite the rapid increase in infections.

On the contrary, tens of millions of people in China have recently been trapped after discovering more than 3,000 infections every day.

With 17 million inhabitants bordering Hong Kong, the Shenzhen Technology Hub was restricted after discovering cases of Covid-19 in factories and regions on Monday.

“When Shenzhen is closed, how can I be so careless and go to the beach? It's selfish.” “, claimed by a user on the Chinese social network Weibo.

Researchers believe that infection rates in Hong Kong may be higher than official figures and can reach half of the 7.4 million inhabitants.

Hall/dhc/co/mass/zm