As someone who has tested positive for Covid-19 in both Britain and Hong Kong , I’ve experienced the worst of both worlds.
In one, I fell victim to the entire failure to see the disease’s spread, and within the other I got trapped during a zealous system intended to completely eradicate Covid-19.

The pandemic’s true tragedy is that the virus has killed nearly four million people worldwide, but it’s also accompany widespread repercussions. After undergoing four quarantines, the one once I actually had Covid-19 was the smallest amount traumatic. For me, pandemic measures are far harder to affect than the disease itself.

I’m a Franco-British national with a British husband. We sleep in Hong Kong , where they need a number of the harshest anti-Covid-19 measures within the world.

Non-residents aren’t allowed in, incoming travelers now got to quarantine during a hotel at their own expense, and, if you’ve got been in touch with a positive case, you’ll be whisked away to a government quarantine camp for a minimum of 14 days. Some parents are separated from their children if one loved one tests positive.
I tested positive for the primary time within the summer of 2020, once we took our four-month-old daughter to ascertain family within the UK. At the time, Asia was still on Covid alert, but our friends within the UK said the worst had passed. Yes, we might have a 14-day home quarantine once we returned to Hong Kong , but to us it had been well worth the sacrifice so as for our families to satisfy our baby. and that we promised we might take care .

The desperate families still torn apart by Covid rules

Covid disorientation

Looking back, I realize how naïve we were. In Hong Kong , people are publicly shamed for not wearing masks, temperatures are taken before entering any public premises, and cleaners disinfect elevators and escalator handrails every hour.

In the UK, few people wore masks, including waiters in pubs and restaurants. It seemed mad to me that strangers breathing down on our food wasn’t seen as a drag during an epidemic .

Less than every week after we arrived within the UK, my dad tested positive for Covid. Then my mum did. Then I did. My husband and baby somehow tested negative, but a couple of days later had symptoms.
The only real difficulty I had breathing was from the scare I had the morning following our test results.

As we tested positive soon after noticing symptoms, there was still the important possibility that one among us would get seriously ill. the primary few nights I barely slept; I kept checking that my baby was still breathing before sneaking right down to the ground below to see that my parents were still breathing too.

The worst of my symptoms came four days after testing positive, but they were nothing quite a nasty cold and a cough. because the days glided by , we all relaxed and decided to enjoy the garden as we waited the top of our quarantine. We knew we had got off lightly, unlike many others. Looking back, it had been an idyllic quarantine.
Back in Hong Kong , it had been very different.
Return to Hong Kong

At first, i used to be relieved to be returning to a city where everyone took the virus seriously. We’d delayed our return by a couple of weeks to form sure we were fully recovered.

My husband and that i decided he would travel ahead to ascertain if he tested positive on arrival. He didn’t, which gave us confidence that i would not either, so I followed with our daughter shortly afterwards. At the time, incoming travelers didn’t got to provide proof of a negative test before flying.

But the morning after landing in Hong Kong , I received a call from an “unknown number.” Before I answered, I instinctively knew it had been bad news.
A lady asked for my name, where I had been sitting on the plane and who I had talked to.

My heart sank: i noticed she was contact tracing — which I had tested positive.

The ambulance was on its way; i might be taken to the hospital.

The tourists who believe travel restrictions don’t apply to them

I called my husband in tears, packed my bags and my baby and waited. I had no idea which hospital i might be taken to, or if my baby could stick with me. She could; doctors realized I had an old infection, in order that they said it had been safe.

In the communicable disease Ward, we had daily Covid tests and check-ins with the doctor. i might only be discharged if I had two negative tests during a row.

I began to despair. I had been positive for 6 weeks; was I getting to be locked during this room for an additional six? Visitors weren’t allowed, and medical staff only entered my room fully hazmat suits. Anxiety, boredom, and loneliness seeped through me. I felt sort of a prisoner.

One of the doctors, noticing my growing agitation, agreed to refer me to the hospital’s psychologist, whom I even have seen a minimum of once a month since. As i used to be during a hospital, that was quite easily arranged, and therefore the psychologist video-called me the subsequent day. But such services are simply not available within the city’s other quarantine centers, they said.

It took 10 days to urge the elusive consecutive double negatives to “qualify” for discharge. But my elation was quashed when the on-duty nurse bluntly told me social services was coming to return devour my 5-month-old daughter to require her to government quarantine, alone, for 14 days. “Because she is close contact,” i used to be told.

My reaction was hysterical. Thankfully my doctors were even as outraged as i used to be , and convinced Hong Kong health authorities to let my daughter quarantine with me reception .

This was an absolute victory, though my husband, who had just finished a 14-day quarantine period reception the night before, had to quarantine with us again for an additional fortnight .

It took me a couple of weeks to completely mentally recover. the strain from all the uncertainties of that hospital stay kept me during a state of constant high alert. I kept awakening within the middle of the night from nightmares where i used to be trapped.

After a spate of traumatic cases involving parents separated from their children, the govt said in March: “For cases where children are involved, each and each decision has been made within the interests of the youngsters and their families.”

Surviving a hotel quarantine … with ki

As Hong Kong began easing Covid restrictions in early March, I returned to a traditional routine.

A week later, that “unknown number” came abreast of my screen again.

This time, i used to be an in depth contact of a positive case at my gym and had to isolate at a government quarantine camp for 14 days.

My initial reaction was panic. Memories of my hospital stay bubbled to the fore, but a minimum of this point my husband and baby were coming with me. We all tested negative subsequent day.

Rooms within the Penny Bay quarantine camp are a touch over a 150 square feet (14 square meters). The staff had fitted in an additional cot next to 2 single beds, which didn’t leave tons of additional room for our child, who was then 10 months old.
We weren’t allowed to go away the space , open windows or doors; food and essentials were delivered through the window in small plastic bags by staff fully hazmat suits.

Meals were chosen from a reasonably extensive menu, but the food was faraway from appetizing. a couple of weeks after our stay, there was a gastrointestinal disorder outbreak and therefore the catering company was changed.

It was possible to urge items delivered, though the practice was discouraged; a full list and pictures of the things had to be submitted via Whatsapp for approval before they might be dropped off.
We were never told why such stringent measures had been implemented.

Getting Covid-19 carries stigma in Hong Kong . i do not dare tell folks that I even have had it, because I worry that i will be able to be judged. My physiotherapist said I had been silly and selfish to possess gone back to the united kingdom . I’m still struggling to know why people that get sick are made to feel so guilty.

What it’s wish to travel from the US to Hong Kong immediately
Vaccination era

The systems in Hong Kong have worked for the town up to some extent . Covid simply doesn’t desire a priority here anymore. There has been one locally transmitted case within the last 14 days, and only a couple in over a month. With their aggressively efficient contact tracing, the few are sacrificed for the security of the many .

In March, the govt announced all over-30s were now eligible for vaccines, and a couple of weeks later all over-18s were too. once I heard of the expansive rollout, i used to be so hopeful and relieved, it held the promise of life returning to normal. But that wasn’t to be. Getting vaccinated here makes little tangible difference and restrictions aren’t being eased.
Frustrations remain high among the expat community in Hong Kong , a key group within the city’s financial sector. the sole way we will resume a traditional life is thru herd immunity. Hong Kongers are largely not curious about getting vaccinated, despite a highly efficient booking system unrolled since February.

In a city of seven million people, 19.7 percent have had two doses of either the Sinovac or BioNTech vaccine.
Some small concessions are made, vaccinated travelers have had their hotel quarantine reduced from 21 to 14 or 7 days if traveling back from small pool of nations considered less risky.

On Monday, summer solstice the Hong Kong government announced that vaccinated travelers who test positive for antibodies will soon only be required to try to to a 7-day hotel quarantine. But the united kingdom has just been added back to the high-risk list, requiring a 21-day hotel quarantine no matter vaccination status.

How a 30,000-member Facebook group helps Hong Kong navigate one among the world’s longest quarantines
And for the primary time in over a year, non-residents could also be allowed into the town within the next few weeks.

Now, three months on from my last Covid quarantine, i’m considering another three weeks of hotel confinement within the autumn, hoping it’ll truly be my last. this is often a choice that i will be able to be making knowing full well Hong Kong’s requirements for re-entry. My family in England isn’t only wanting to create a bond with my daughter, but they need been browsing life events that require my support and a spotlight .

I do have lingering worries about how being locked up during a room for 3 weeks will affect my daughter. Will the advantages of visiting her family outweigh the drawbacks? I honestly do not know . Some friends think i’m crazy, many are supportive.

The city’s draconian Covid travel restrictions, including a deteriorating political situation, means expat friends and colleagues are leaving in droves. I hear of latest departures a day .
I completely understand the impulse. But, because we love Hong Kong , i’m hoping that my husband, daughter and that i can stick it out until the planet sees the rear of Covid-19.
The city, of course, must act in its citizens’ best interest, and has undoubtedly saved many from deaths with its ruthless “zero Covid” policy, unlike my home nations.

When we moved to Hong Kong , we knew the town was on the opposite side of the planet , but with modern travel it never felt that far way. it had been always possible to be home within each day .

But that’s not the case; the pandemic has made the planet feel as big because it is really is.