Press Releases

SFH on MERS and contaminated water incident

Following is the transcript of remarks made by the Secretary for Food and Health, Dr Ko Wing-man, after attending a function today (June 28):

Reporter: Will the Security Bureau consider cancelling the red travel alert for South Korea?

Secretary for Food and Health: In considering whether and when to remove the travel alert, it is most important that we are certain that the transmission of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) in Korea has stopped. To judge whether the transmission has stopped, we traditionally consider one cycle of incubation period, which is up to 14 days. But in order to be absolutely safe, we usually observe two cycles of incubation period, which is up to 28 days. If there is no more additional confirmed case of MERS during the 28 days, we can then be pretty sure that the transmission of the disease in Korea has stopped.

Reporter: (On test results for the contaminated water incident of Cathay Pacific)

Secretary for Food and Health: According to the Port Health Office of the Department of Health, we still have to wait for the test results. Up to this moment, I still do not have an update. Once the test results are available, we will announce them to the public as soon as possible.

(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)

Ends/Sunday, June 28, 2015
Issued at HKT 15:18

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