Over 190 kindergartens and childcare centers in HK urged to close temporarily amid flu outbreak

More than 190 kindergartens and childcare centers that had reported outbreaks of seasonal influenza were urged to close for a week from Saturday by the Center for Health Protection (CHP) of China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government.

CHP Controller Dr. Wong Ka-hing made the recommendation at a press conference on Friday, saying that the decision was made after an inter-departmental meeting convened by the HKSAR government's Food & Health Bureau to tackle the winter influenza peak.

"We noticed that the current influenza-like illness (ILI) outbreak among the kindergartens and childcare centers is at a very high level according to the moving epidemic method that we try to adopt this year," he said.

"At the meeting we considered that it is appropriate to have this enhanced measure at the moment to try to interrupt the transmission that had occurred in a particular school."

Wong noted that the hospitalization rate for children up to the age of five had remained at a high level since the second week of Hong Kong's winter influenza season and the flu activity level was expected to remain high in the coming a few weeks.

The government would monitor and review the situation to decide if the measure would need to be continued until the start of the Chinese New Year holiday or beyond, and whether to further enhance it, he said.

CHP appealed to parents to have their children receive seasonal influenza vaccination (SIV) as soon as possible, and pledged to encourage more kindergartens and childcare centers to participate in the center's student vaccination program.