‘Now we know this foe’: mainland Chinese doctors, nurses dived right into helping Hong Kong tackle fifth wave of Covid-19 infections
- As city’s worst outbreak wanes, mainland Chinese volunteers say they were happy to play a part
- Visiting medical team members had to take care, minimising contact, eating alone in hotel rooms
Respiratory medicine specialist Xiao Guanhua thought his 36th birthday two years ago was unforgettable, as he found himself battling a mysterious, fast-spreading disease in Wuhan, in China’s Hubei province.
He turned 38 on March 11 in Hong Kong, while he was with a team of mainland Chinese doctors and nurses helping with the city’s raging fifth wave of Covid-19 infections.
“It’s very memorable,” said the doctor from Guangzhou, capital of neighbouring Guangdong province. “In Wuhan, we were fighting a largely unknown foe. Two years on, we’ve got to know the virus rather well, but the fifth wave hit Hong Kong really hard.”
Xiao is part of a 391-strong Guangdong contingent who came to Hong Kong, including 78 doctors and 290 nurses from a spectrum of disciplines ranging from respiratory medicine to cardiology and intensive care.
They arrived in three batches from March 7 as Covid-19 cases were shooting up and have been working at the AsiaWorld-Expo temporary treatment facility. At its worst, Hong Kong recorded 58,757 infections and 291 related deaths on March 9.
Xiao said he did not hesitate to step forward when the central government called for volunteers to help in Hong Kong, even though he had just become the father of a baby girl, now almost six months old.
He said he could see that Hongkongers were going through a tough time.
