A Filipina helper was found to be infected with a mutated strain of the Covid virus last week in one of Tung Chung’s 52 floor housing estate blocks, each with of more than 400 flats. This meant that everyone living in those flats, over 1,000 people, was obliged to take a Covid test within the next couple of days.

Although the helper had not travelled out of Hong Kong since 2019, the Hong Kong Government promptly ordered all 370,000 FDHs (Foreign Domestic Helpers), mainly from the Phillipines and Indonesia, to be Covid tested before May 9th. Further, all helpers must now be fully vaccinated against the virus as a condition of  new contracts. The Phillipines government and its consulate in Hong Kong have launched a complaint.

The justification for this new policy is that the helpers “congregate” on their days off, thus making the spread of the infection more likely. You’ll recall that many are not allowed to stay in their homes on their one rest day per week, even if they do have their own space in their employer’s flat, and days off are usually the only time they have to see the dentist, send money home to their families, shop. They often meet up in little groups on the walkways in town, which is what the HK government means by congregating.

If you’re not a helper, however, it’s called having a picnic or a party and other nationalities of expats overtly meet up in groups in their homes – we’ve walked past many parties in the apartments by the promenade here all the way through lockdown. Just the other night we shared space in a cramped restaurant in town with an engagement party of 12 mainly Chinese bright young things, ostensibly separated into groups of four by small Perspex partitions, as is the way here. I’m pretty sure no-one from the Government was calling for any participants in those gatherings to be swab tested by next week. No-one is forcing them to have the vaccination as a condition of their work contracts.

Expats from India are plentiful hereabouts, and also tend to picnic in groups with their masks around their chins – I should make it clear that Indian expats are CERTAINLY not the only culprits here – but I’ve never seen anyone telling them off or trying to impose the fine of HKD 5,000 for that breach.

Now, I’ve seen also justifications for the mandatory vaccination and testing policy on the basis that many countries have vaccine stipulations for foreign workers. Fine. In which case workers from all overseas nationalities, who comprise over 9% of the Hong Kong resident population should also be subject to it. I see no sign of that happening.

As for mandatory vaccination, the Chinese population seems really reluctant to get themselves vaccinated, and take up of our free, brilliantly-organised vaccination programme has been extraordinarily slow. Right now I am one of less than 7% of Hong Kong residents to be fully vaccinated. Only about 13% of Hong Kongers have even had their first jabs, way short of the herd immunity targets which might enable the authorities to ease the strict quarantine regime.

Hong Kongers are, apparently suspicious of both of the vaccines on offer, one of which is the Chinese-made Sinovac which still has not received WHO approval and has a lower efficacy than the alternative Pfizer Fosun Comirnaty mRNA vaccine. It hasn’t helped that the German vaccine was suspended for 10 days just after it started being used due to packaging concerns, and lurid stories of side effects are splashed over the local press.

Hong Kong’s hermetic quarantine and flying squad testing strategy has largely kept the number of cases and deaths here relatively low, and managed to keep a lid on infection spikes in one of the most densely-populated places on earth. Nearly all cases are imported and caught at airport testing or in quarantine and the chances of being infected here are vanishingly small, especially as mask wearing everywhere is still mandatory and hygiene facilities are good.

Lots of Hong Kong Chinese with their friends and families around them who have no need to travel simply not to want to take the tiny risk of side effects or post-vaccination discomfort, it seems. A parade of mainly foreigners under the #HKTwitterGetsVaxxed hashtag, meant to try to encourage rather than coerce or guilt people into taking their shots, seems to have irritated many locals who view it as a sort of neo-colonialist cultural takeover.

I understand that the strategy of targeting helpers is intended to influence their employers to take the vaccine but I’ve heard just today of a helper who has her two jabs booked but whose employer has persuaded her against taking any vaccinations which, I think denies her agency and is not in her best interests in the longer term. As I’ve mentioned before, though, helpers are in a vulnerable situation and their life could be made very difficult by an employer who felt disrespected.

It’s ironic, that the HK government chooses the most powerless groups to coerce and intimidate. FDHs are mainly women who work here to support their families back home, who have now come under increased pressure because of the pandemic. They have few employment rights and many are subjected to vileness by their employers. I think it’s an abuse of privilege to treat them in this way and further stigmatises an already vulnerable community.