Spirit of Hong Kong Awards: teen prodigy pushes frontiers of science and education

Hong Kong student Lee Hok-lam is already making contributions to science and the wider community at the age of 17, after discovering a sense of purpose and direction in the middle of a debating session.

“It all started with a debate,” said the Form Six student, who serves as the captain and supervisor of St Joseph’s College’s English and Chinese debate team.

“We were discussing environmental medicine, and it struck me that I didn’t want to just talk about it – I wanted to do something,” he said, recalling that moment of clarity from the previous academic year.

He was inspired to develop MStarchion, an invention capable of absorbing heavy metals and radioactive isotopes from water.

Lee said the invention had the potential to reduce the number of child deaths resulting from water pollution by up to 97 per cent.

“It’s a big number, but the impact could be huge if we apply it on a larger scale,” he said.