Until last Saturday, anyone wanting to visit Hong Kong including Hong Kong residents had to go into a 3 week quarantine programme to which was added a 1 week period of "observation". Unsurprisingly, visitor numbers and even those with family members in Hong Kong have stayed away in droves. Last Saturday the 3-week quarantine was reduced to 2, but I know several people who have been desperate to return to their businesses for many months but refuse to do so until the quarantine period is relaxed.

The irony is that despite such strict quarantine, numbers of new cases reached their highest levels yesterday since the pandemic began. Some mild, asymptomatic or vaccinated people are being sent to the quarantine recovery centre at Penny's Bay. In effect, this is little more than an up-market concentration camp. Because of this, many people, especially young people, are resisting getting tested.

As one young resident stated, the government "single-mindedly obsesses with getting back to zero Covid" in order to please Beijing. Prof. Ben Cowling, an epidemiologist at the University of Hong Kong, believes the number of reported cases is considerably lower than the actual number.

What a mess!

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/07/hong-kong-reports-highest-number-of-covid-cases-since-pandemic-began 

#1  Detaining people who test positive will only discourage testing. So published case numbers become meaningless.  Just like in Thailand.

#2. Most of the world is quickly figuring out that zero COVID is impossible and we have to live with it.   I'm not quite sure why China is behind, but guess either they are cautious as they know their vaccines are less effective, or the dictator wants less travel to democratic countries in future.