Among the death cases of six men and four women aged 69 to 105, only two have received three doses of Covid vaccines, and all were previously diagnosed with different diseases.

Health authorities announced plans to launch the third phase of the scheme to designate hospital beds that can be available for 600 newly admitted Covid patients every day.

Under the new scheme, 2,500 to 5,000 beds in AsiaWorld-Expo, North Lantau Hospital, and other hospitals will be reserved to accept patients.

“Around 800 beds in North Lantau Hospital Hong Kong Infection Control Center are already in full operation,” said Larry Lee Lap-yip, Chief Manager (Integrated Clinical Services) of the Hospital Authority, “500 beds in Asia World-Expo Treatment Center are still available.”

More beds will be added with more health staff equipped, Lee said.

Non-emergency services for patients in public hospitals are reduced since the rising cases caused pressure on the health resources, he added.

“Around 20 percent of the services will be affected,” noted Lee.

Cases infected with the BA.4 or BA.5 variant of the coronavirus account for 37.1 percent of the whole confirmed cases this week, said Chuang Shuk-kwan, Head of the Communicable Disease Branch of the Center for Health Protection of the Department of Health.

“The increasing cases reported is predictable since BA.5 spreads faster compared to other variants of the virus,” she pointed out.

Chuang urged citizens to get full doses of Covid vaccines since the efficacy of the antibody created from two jabs is not as powerful as three jabs, according to a report by the World Health Organization.

Public hospitals now accommodate 2,139 Covid-19 patients, including 310 newly admitted, 43 in critical conditions, and 37 with severe symptoms.