Hong Kong’s public hospitals to offer non-invasive Down’s syndrome test for free to women with high-risk pregnancies
Test, which costs HK$5,000 in private clinics, currently not available in public hospitals
From next year, women with high-risk pregnancies will be able to take a free non-invasive test for Down’s syndrome at Hong Kong’s public hospitals, instead of having to pay HK$5,000 for it in the private sector.
World-renowned molecular scientist Dr Dennis Lo Yuk-ming, whose findings two decades ago led to the screenings being done globally today, said women whose initial ultrasound scans and blood tests suggest their unborn child is at risk of congenital abnormalities would get the free test.
He confirmed he was training a team from Queen Mary Hospital to do the test, which requires a blood sample and also screens for other chromosomal disorders.
“We are working to transfer this technology to the Hospital Authority,” the Li Ka-shing professor of medicine at Chinese University (CUHK) said.
The new children’s hospital in Kai Tak could administer the test when it opens at the end of this year, the 54-year-old added. The Hospital Authority on Friday confirmed it planned for the test, which can be done when a woman is five weeks pregnant, to be launched at the hospital early next year.