Hong Kong govt. revises community testing services

HONG KONG The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government has implemented a series of enhancements on Friday to provide residents with ample, high-quality, fast-accessible and affordable community testing services.

The government said that a number of mobile specimen collection stations will be regularized as community testing centers CTC and community testing stations CTS service hours will be extended and standardized. All 85 CTC CTSs will provide self-paid testing services at two pricing tiers starting in October.

A green lane will be set at CTC CTSs for high risk persons like staff members of residential care homes and nursing homes to save time spent on site, according to the statement.

More testing agencies have been engaged in a competitive procurement process to carry out community testing services.

With the participation of more contractors, it can boost the local community's testing capacity and increase testing capacity. It can also increase the speed and convenience of nucleic acid testing, said a government spokesman.

About half of CTC CTSs will have new service providers, so services will be suspended temporarily on some of the dates.

The SAR government will not take a lie flat approach to anti-epidemic work and will continue to do its utmost to contain the epidemic under a targeted approach with a view to yield the greatest effects with the lowest costs, he said.