SDURING THE mid-March, all Hong Kong residents over the age of 30 are eligible to book a vaccination. They even have the luxury choice: between the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine created in Germany or one manufactured by Sinovac, a Chinese firm. Despite a huge supply, only about 8% of the population chose to get a chance. One of the reasons is the confidence in the government, the result of two years of political unrest. This is just one way in which the breakdown of the freedoms of Hong Kong has further combated the virus.
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The incidence of vaccinations in Hong Kong lags far behind in comparable places such as Singapore, where about 20% of the people are vaccinated. A survey conducted in January, before the vaccination process began, found that only 37% of Hong Kongers wanted a sting. Since then, local media have not seen the number of people die in the days and weeks after a vaccination, despite abundant evidence that vaccination makes death less likely. Infection rates are fairly low, and people who worry about side effects feel they can afford to take their chances. On April 15, the government said they were on the verge of allowing people aged 16-29 to get one.
Vaccination of vaccines has strongly politicized. The big role that Sinovac’s vaccine gets is controversial (in the photo, people are waiting to receive it). Sinovac has not published data from clinical trials of “phase three” in peer-reviewed journals, which is an important international standard. It appears to be less effective than the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, which reduces the risk of catching covid-19 by more than 90%. Trials of Sinovac’s jab find efficacy rates ranging from 83% to just over 50%, the threshold within which the World Health Organization considers a vaccine suitable for general use. At a conference on April 10, Gao Fu, a Chinese health official, apparently accepted that the effectiveness of China’s vaccines was not very high and that it might be wise to combine them with a dose of another product ( later he said remarks were misinterpreted).
The Hong Kong Vaccine Approval Committee has not been asked to consider the effectiveness of Chinese jab compared to Pfizer-BioNTechs (distributed in Hong Kong by Fosun Pharma, a Chinese company) or any other vaccine used by the peer has not been judged, Keiji says. Fukuda, one of the members of the committee. “The politicians all have Sinovac and the medical experts all BioNTech: what does that tell you?” says a medical scientist in Hong Kong. China has made vaccination decisions more difficult by saying it will expedite visa applications for people proving they have received a vaccine manufactured by the Chinese; consequently, some people with family or business on the continent feel compelled to accept it. ‘About one-third who took Sinovac were forced, another third did so for some kind of personal gain or to get a favor from someone and the last third just wanted to be vaccinated,’ says another healthcare specialist. .
Tense politics have complicated Hong Kong’s response since the virus was first detected. In January 2020, Carrie Lam, the leader of the area, protested against the closure of the border with the mainland, saying it would be ‘discriminatory’. In response, 9,000 medical workers went on strike in a pro-democracy union. More than 60% of the people surveyed by the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute supported them.
In September, the government offered free covid-19 tests to the entire population. This policy is derived from mandatory test campaigns in the city that took place in some parts of mainland China. Still, less than 1.8 million Hong Kong residents accepted the show, out of 7.5 million. The refusal of the test was a way of expressing dissatisfaction with the government. And some suspicious residents were frustrated that they DNA could end up on the mainland of China. Surveillance concerns have also made people wary of cell phone apps, which they are supposed to use for contact tracing by recording their details when they go to places like restaurants.
The perception that Hong Kong’s health officials are taking instructions from their mainland counterparts is getting worse. Some traveled to Shenzhen in December to discuss ideas for detecting and restricting the virus with authorities there. Since then, officials have carried out the so-called “ambush-style lock-up,” in which apartment blocks are cordoned off at short notice and all are tested inside.
A report published in February by researchers from three universities in Hong Kong argues that informal networks that emerged during the 2019 protests against democracy could have withstood the city the first part of the pandemic. Pro-democracy groups have arranged bulk purchases of surgical masks and disinfectants. Families, friends and neighbors reminded each other to wear masks and social distance, and they took advantage of lessons from 2003 SARS, a disease caused by another coronavirus, has killed nearly 300 people in the city.
Yet a comprehensive security law passed in June 2020 has devastated civil society. Most prominent pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong are now in jail or in exile. Few other people in Hong Kong have enough credibility to overcome locals’ warning against vaccination. Pro-Beijing politicians are not trusted much. Many of the celebrities made famous by Hong Kong’s entertainment industries – who are aware that mainland China is the largest market – have expressed support for the Communist Party during the 2019 protests. This has brought them into disrepute for many.
Most public health experts are concerned about the way China’s jab is being promoted in Hong Kong, but are afraid to talk about it in public, say three such people. They worry that discussing the effectiveness of a Chinese vaccination will harm their careers, or even be seen as a violation of the city’s new security law, which bans any act that ‘undermines’ the work of local or central governments. . When the Communist Party introduced the legislation last summer, Ms Lam said it wanted to help Hong Kong “become normal again”. It is very far from there. ■
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This article appears in the China section of the print edition under the heading “A patriotic jab, or one that works better?”