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Opinion | Hong Kong must step out of the darkness and embrace coronavirus vaccines
- Eroding English standards, mistrust of the government and echo chamber chat forums have all contributed to the refusal to get vaccinated
- Education and honest information that transcends borders are needed to end the delusion and bring Hong Kong into the light
Reading Time:3 minutes
Why you can trust SCMP
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Why would anyone say no to life? Yet, in Hong Kong, a bustling financial city with several universities ranked among the world’s best and no dearth of bright minds, there is a puzzling reluctance for people to roll up their sleeves and get a Covid-19 vaccine.
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This stubborn refusal to help the world inch closer to herd immunity prompted Professor Lam Tai-hing, from the University of Hong Kong, to lament on RTHK that people “should be ashamed of themselves”. He is right.
Singapore and Hong Kong, two places frequently compared with their majority Chinese population and statistical similarities, differ vastly on this issue.
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By the end of May, Singapore had fully vaccinated 30 per cent of its population with more than 4 million doses administered. Meanwhile, Hong Kong had fully vaccinated just 15 per cent of its population and given out 2.7 million doses, a sad tally for a city at the forefront of virology and epidemiological research since the 2003 severe acute respiratory syndrome outbreak.
Vaccinations are a necessary global deterrent to global pandemics. This is how a scourge like smallpox was eradicated – with determined, often compulsory inoculations at schools and hospitals. The US Supreme Court weighed in on this in 1905, comparing vaccinations in a health emergency to conscriptions during war.
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