Office of the Ombudsman to investigate sale of masks made at Correctional Services facilities

The demand for masks have surged due to the Coronavirus epidemic and that includes masks manufactured by detainees at Correctional Services facilities. Recently, these CSI-made masks have been found for sale in the open market . On 5 March, the Office of the Ombudsman announced that they have launched an investigation into the matter by examining and reviewing the systems and procedures involved in the production, distribution, inventory control and storage of CSI-made masks at the Correctional Services Department and the Government Logistics Department.

Masks manufactured by the Correctional Services (known as CSI masks)
are mostly supplied to government departments with a small number being sold to non-government organisations, social welfare organisations and schools. But recently a small quantity of of CSI masks have been found for sale online leading to suspicions that they are being resold without permission. The Office of Ombudsman received complaints about this and decided to initiate an investigation.

The Office of the Ombudsman has also invited citizens to provide related information and suggestions on the case on or before 06 April in writing, including emailing to complaints@ombudsman.hk .

The Ombudsman was established in 1989 by the Ombudsman Ordinance. The Ombudsman is entitled to call witnesses and access relevant data for investigative purposes. It has a wide range of investigative powers: conducting inquiries, obtaining information and documents, summoning witnesses and inspecting the premises of organisations under complaint.

The Ombudsman may report findings and make recommendations for redress or improvements to the organisation. Heads of organisations have a duty to report at regular intervals their progress of implementation of those recommendations. However, the Ombudsman may not interfere with any actions taken by the organizations.

Earlier, the Correctional Services have said that since the Coronavirus broke out, all CSI masks have been supplied to the Government Logistics Department with none being sold to non-governmental bodies. Official notices also claimed that because the Correctional Services has been providing masks for non-governmental organisations before the epidemic, it was “normal for some civilians to use those masks”.

The Police Force confirmed earlier, that no arrest has been made for the selling of CSI masks.

Source : Apple Daily
#6Mar #FaceMasks

Stained and Very Thin Masks Provided by Education Bureau to Hong Kong Students,
Logistics Department Confirms Origin from China and Russia

The Education Bureau in Hong Kong previously announced, that they would provide masks and let school distribute them to students sitting for this year’s DSE Examinations, a public exam crucial to university admission in Hong Kong.

Stand News received 2 complaints from students, who found the masks too thin and stained with yellow marks. In response to the inquiries made by Stand News, the Education Bureau said that the 500,000 masks for local students were supplied by the Government Logistics Department. No complaints had been received from the schools.

The Logistic Department confirmed that the masks were not expired and they came from China and Russia.

Source: Stand News #Mar10
#FaceMasks #DSE #Exam #EducationBureau #FailedState

#StateTerrorism
Hong Kong Government to Turn Down Proposal Passed in Directly Elected District Council

On March 11, the Community Emergency Response Team of Tun Mun District Council passed the proposal of applying for a government funding of 3 million dollars to purchases protective gear, including gas masks and filters.

Tuen Mun District Officer Fung Ngar-wai opposed to the purchase, and said that even though the proposal had been passed in the district council, the Home Affairs Department possesses the rights for final decisions. Fung explained that, if the funding amount exceeded 1.2 million dollars, it would to require an approval from the Home Affairs Department. She also said in a threatening tone, ” If the purchase items were not cost-effective, we will not approve.”

Source: InMedia #Mar12
#DistrictCouncil #FaceMasks

#FaceMasks #SelfHelp
Made-in-Hong Kong Masks:
The Return of Local Industries?

At the results announcement on March 19, Victor Li, son of tycoon Ka-Shing Li and chairman of CK Hutchison Holdings Limited, seemed to imply that the group might start a production line to manufacture "Made in Hong Kong" facemasks.

Source: HKET #Mar19

#FailedState #Taxpayers #FaceMasks
Where are the 13-million masks produced on public fund?: Hong Kong Government Refuses to Answer

In mid-February, “Hong Kong Connection”, an investigative programme of RTHK, conducted a study to find out how the Hong Kong government uses the prisoner-made "CSI" masks.

RTHK invoked the “Code on Access to Information” and requested the Logistics Services Department to disclose the number of CSI masks and protective robes the government procured from the Correctional Services Department between 2017 and 2019, as well as the amount allocated to other departments.

On April 1, 2020, the Logistics Services Department responded but refused to disclose informatio “as not to undermine the bargaining power in purchasing protective gear amidst fierce competition”. The department emphasized that the Government has been making every effort to procure anti-epidemic materials.

In mid-February, the Financial Services and Treasury Bureau had revealed that the Logistics Department had purchased an average of 1.1 million masks per month from the Correctional Services Department in 2019. Earlier on, the Correctional Services Department said that in 2019, social welfare agencies, schools and other non-governmental organizations had purchased about 120,000 masks from them.

Reported widely in media was how the government-owned CSI masks were available for sale. Many have been questioning whether the filter masks have been mis-distributed for reselling purpose.

Apparently, the Government is evading to fully disclose the allocation and whereabouts of about 13 million CSI masks produced every year.

Source: 'Hong Kong Connection' RTHK

#Apr5 #CSI #HongKongGovernment

#WuhanPneumonia #ThirdWave #CoronavirusPandemic
‘Third Wave Of Infections Will Come From China’, Hong Kong Microbiologist Says Medical Staff Might Need to Reuse Disinfected N95 Masks

University of Hong Kong microbiologist Dr. Yuen Kwok-yung warned that China is facing another wave of infections that could eventually bring a ‘third wave’ of cases to Hong Kong.

Yuen mentioned that it will likely be caused by China going back to work en masse and the recent return of overseas Chinese from virus hotspots like the United States or Europe.

“This kind of cycle will continue on and on until we have an effective vaccine, or we acquire herd immunity, where about 60-80 percent of people are immune to Covid-19.”

Yuen states that he is not optimistic about the epidemic in Hong Kong at this stage, and medical staff might need to be prepared to reuse disinfected N95 masks, similar to what had been in during SARS in 2003.

Source: Commercial Radio 881903; RTHK

#Apr5 #YuenKwokYun #HongKongMedics #FaceMasks

Police Pulls Down Citizen's Facemask to Photograph Face During Arrest

2030 | Mongkok

Source: Now News #May10

#MothersDay #PoliceState #FaceMasks

How Hongkongers fight coronavirus on their own

Given Carrie Lam and Her Government have again and again shown a high degree of incompetence, Hongkongers have trusted the puppets no more, especially in this #epidemic time.

Hong Kong citizens have organized their own #coronavirus countermeasures since January 2020, when the mysterious viral pneumonia was circulating in Wuhan. Hongkongers initiated to wear #facemasks when they went to public places, and they paid particular attention to personal hygiene. Meanwhile, Carrie Lam, Hong Kong's Chief Executive handpicked by Beijing, was staying in Switzerland without a sense of crisis.

Although more than 7,000 medical workers staged an unprecedented strike, Carrie Lam dragged her feet in closing the city’s borders, and never fully closed down the land border with Mainland China -- the most hazardous source of coronavirus.

Furthermore, Lam wavered on facemasks, and even ordered civil servants not to wear them. Meanwhile, public and private hospitals were facing shortage of personal protective equipment. The incompetent government also ignored the empty shelves in stores and shortage of crucial supplies such as rice, noodles, and toilet rolls.

In response, Hongkongers created their own websites to track local information of COVID-19, including the resources of protective equipment and track cases of COVID-19. They get used to looking up instant notification and critically analyzing information through anonymous channels in Telegram, which had been initially used to protect human rights activists from government repression.

For the shortage of facemasks, an “army of volunteers” spread among the intensely crowded and often decrepit tenement buildings to install and keep filled hand-sanitizer dispensers.

Realtime digital maps were not just confined to track police blockades and clashes, they were also used to keep track of outbreak locations and hand-sanitizer distribution points. Moreover, there were volunteers sanitizing subdivided flats with affordable UVC lights.

Lam’s government eventually responded, but it was always a step behind the people.

The Government coped with the epidemic in their way, for example, setting up quarantine centers in dense neighborhoods without public consultation, or even worse, against public opinions.

Hongkongers' self help was not in vain. In early February, the financial outlet Bloomberg ran an opinion piece that compared Hong Kong to a “failed state”. And yet there is no unchecked, devastating COVID-19 epidemic in Hong Kong. Hongkongers, on their own, beat back the original wave, and also beat back a second resurgence due to imported cases.

This success should be attributed to the self-disciplined Hongkongers, who seared with the memory of SARS in 2003 and evolved into a united group during the movement in 2019. Hongkongers act swiftly, collectively, and efficiently. Besides, thanks partly to its history of fighting epidemics, Hong Kong has some of the world’s most prominent experts in infectious diseases.

Now that life returns to normal in Hong Kong, it also means that Hongkongers have to return to the life of protesting: fighting for the release of pan-democracy protesters, and fighting against the bad popo and oppressive legislation such as the "Article 23 Enactment".

The road ahead is certainly challenging, #Hongkongers know that, but they will not yield.

Further reading:
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2020/05/how-hong-kong-beating-coronavirus/611524/

#Coronavirus #SelfHelp #Hongkongers

#WuhanPneumonia #WHO
Hong Kong Microbiologist Prof. Yuen Kwok-Yung’s research proves WHO is wrong about masks

During the hot summer, a lot of citizens will feel discomfort wearing face masks. WHO has doubted on multiple occasions the effectiveness of using face masks to prevent the spread of Wuhan Pneumonia. Professor Yuen Kwok-Yung and his research team from the Department of Microbiology at the University of Hong Kong were the first to use the golden Syrian hamster model to show that using face masks can reduce the chance of contracting Wuhan Pneumonia. They also found that infected hamsters with a face mask was more effective at reducing the transmission rate than healthy hamsters with a face mask.

The research team performed three rounds of testing on 13 infected hamsters and 39 healthy hamsters. They put the two groups of hamsters in a cage and used a fan to create airflow from the infected hamsters towards the healthy hamsters. Surgical masks were used to filter the virus. In the first group, there was no surgical mask placed between the two cages of hamsters. In the second group, a surgical mask was placed outside the cage of the infected hamsters to simulate infected hamsters using face masks. In the third group, a face mask was placed outside the cage of the healthy hamsters to simulate healthy hamsters using face masks. Each experiment lasted 7 days and overall the experiment took 1 month to complete.

The results showed with no face mask as a barrier, 66.7% of healthy hamsters got infected after 7 days. In the healthy hamsters with a face mask, the infection rate was 33.3%. In the case of the infected hamsters with a face mask, only 16.7% of healthy hamsters got infected. This indicates the use of face masks by infected patients would result in a lower rate of infection than healthy patients with face masks on who are not carrying the virus.

Professor Yuen points out this experiment scientifically proved that using face masks can effectively prevent the spread of Wuhan Pneumonia. He understands that demanding Hong Kongers to use face masks for an extended period of time is difficult during the summer. Recently, (a survey showed that) less than 90% of adults were using a face mask. He hopes that Hong Kongers will continue to use a face mask. “With face masks on, even if you get infected, the viral load will be lower, it will take longer for symptoms to develop and with less severity. This buys us time to provide treatment, thus reducing mortality and leads to better recovery.” He also calls for citizens who have mild symptoms to get tested in government clinics to reduce the chance of creating an invisible transmission chain in the community.

Source: Apple Daily #May17
#YuenKwokYung #FaceMasks #Research

#AsiasFinest #HongKongPolice #CSIMasks #FaceMasks
Where Did the Masks Go? Gov't Report: Police Received 7.08 Million Masks over 7 months

Source: Apple Daily #Aug22

Read more
⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️
https://t.me/guardiansofhongkong/24561

#WuhanPneumonia #CSIMasks #FaceMasks

Where Did the Masks Go? Gov't Report: Police Received 7.08 Million Masks over 7 months

Hong Kong experienced a shortage of masks during the first wave of Wuhan Pneumonia early this year. With citizens scrambling for masks across the city, many questioned the whereabouts of the government's stockpile of CSi masks, produced locally by inmates under Correctional Services.

According to a report to the Legislature on August 21, 2020, the government released its records on personal protective equipment from the first 7 months of the year, including the number of masks distributed to its various departments.

The Hong Kong Police Force is shown to have received over 3.47 million masks made by CSi. This exceeds even the number received by the Department of Health, which ranked second, by over 300,000. Nearly 50 million masks were also procured from sources other than CSi for various government departments. Of these, the Police Force received 3.61 million masks, ranking fourth behind Social Welfare Department (13 million), Housing Authority (8.27 million), and Food and Environmental Hygiene Department (7.6 million).

With the 7.08 million masks received, the Police Force had enough to supply its 31,190 members with 226 masks each, averaging more than one per day during the 7-month period.

Chief Executive Carrie Lam was widely noted for demanding her officials to "take off your mask even if you're wearing one" during the most severe period of shortage. However, the report noted that the Chief Executive's Office had received over 13,000 masks over the course of the 7 months, of which over 11,000 were made by CSi.

The offices of the Chief Secretary and Financial Secretary have similarly received some 13,000 masks, more than Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau, Development Bureau, and a number of other departments.

Source: Apple Daily #Aug22
https://hk.appledaily.com/local/20200822/PHRQBFHHFBDLJL3C555JNR3DEQ/

#AsiasFinest #HongKongPolice

#EditorialColumn #Sept26 #MassSurveillance
Does Health Have a Price? Consequences of China's Paternalism

From the recent Universal Testing Scheme to the impending plan for Heath Code, the Hong Kong Government has been assisting the Chinese Central Government to impose mass surveillance and collect private data of the Hong Kong population in the name of pandemic controls.

For almost one year, the coronavirus pandemic, spreading from Wuhan, China to countries around the world, has revealed China's network of influence. Hong Kong is certainly not the only place where China exports, while naturalizing, its paternalistic control.

Can you see how China jails the Uyghurs in Concentration Camps?

Can you see the surveillance cameras owned by the CCP-controlled HIKvision around the world?

Can you see the backdoors that China-owned Huawei, WeChat and Tiktok open?

Can you see that the made-in-China facemasks you pay to wear came from forced labour at the Concentration camps and sweatshop factories?

Now you can see the penetration of China's sharp power in the 21st century.

If you found it disturbing that your internet activities might be overseen by the PRISM program and your messages seen by Facebook, the black mirror is brought to you by TikTok, WeChat and mass surveillance methods that track your health, contacts, whereabouts and activities.

Welcome to a made-in-China 2020: with surveillance technology, anti-pandemic control and monitoring system.

Welcome to utopia.

Image courtesy: The Economist

=======
Reference:
New York Times, Wearing a Mask? It May Come From China’s Controversial Labor Program, 19 July 2020

https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/asia/100000007226041/china-coronavirus-masks-uighur-labor-ppe.html

Further Reading:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/17/opinion/tiktok-china-strategy.html

#FaceMasks #LabourCamp #CoronavirusPandemic #Uyghurs #ChinesePaternalism #Health