Coronavirus: Hong Kong Disneyland Resort hotels suggested as quarantine centres
- Tourism lawmaker calls on government to look at using resort’s remote accommodation for isolation
- Ministers are scrambling to find quarantine sites with confirmed infections increasing
Calls grew on Wednesday to use hotels at Hong Kong Disneyland Resort as quarantine centres as the city tackled the deadly coronavirus outbreak.
Former chief secretary Henry Tang Ying-yen added his voice to calls from lawmakers and urged the government to look at isolating those caught in the outbreak at the theme’s park accommodation, which is located in a secluded area of Lantau Island. The park is closed because of the outbreak.
Laying out his suggestions, Tang, chairman of the pro-Beijing Friends of Hong Kong Association, said part of the People’s Liberation Army’s Shek Kong Barracks in Yuen Long and vacant land next to the theme park could be considered as well. He is also a member of China’s top political advisory body, the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.
Separately, the city’s leader Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor said she would invoke the chief executive’s special powers under the Prevention and Control of Disease Ordinance and require all travellers entering from the mainland, including Hong Kong residents, to go into quarantine.
Lam said officials were actively seeking proposals to add more quarantine facilities in the city, which currently only had three centres.
