World News

Hong Kong suspends not effective COVID flight ban

Hong Kong‘s new government on Thursday suspended a longstanding flight route ban that penalised airlines for bringing in coronavirus cases and severely impeded travel into the city, saying it was “not very effective”.
The financial hub has become increasingly isolated under harsh pandemic restrictions as it mirrors a lighter version of China’s strict zero-COVID policy, with the once busy Hong Kong airport now a relative aviation graveyard.

On Thursday, new city leader John Lee’s government said the “circuit breaker” rule was being suspended to “achieve the most in fighting the pandemic with the minimum cost on the society”. At the current stage, continued implementation of the ‘circuit breaker’ mechanism is not very effective in preventing imported cases,” the government said.

“Large number of passengers will have their itineraries disrupted due to the mechanism, and as the supply of seats on planes and quarantine hotel rooms fall short, the social costs generated will be remarkably high.”

Reopening Hong Kong’s border both with mainland China and the rest of the world was one of former top-cop John Lee’s main campaign objectives before being selected to run the city by a small committee of Beijing loyalists in May. But it is unclear how his administration can achieve both objectives at the same time.

Lee told the city’s legislature on Wednesday that Hong Kong was not ready to abandon its zero-COVID policy. Hong Kong is currently facing an uptick of COVID-19 cases with numbers at their highest level since April.

Source: eNCA

In other news – Wedding bells for Somizi Mhlongo

South African media personality, Somizi Mhlongo is getting married, again! He has been dating his boyfriend for a while now.

Somizi Mhlongo

The information is contained in the latest episode of Living the Dream with Somizi season 5. Learn more