18 Facts About Yuen Kwok-yung

Yuen Kwok-yung is a Hong Kong microbiologist, physician and surgeon.

Yuen Kwok-yung worked at the United Christian Hospital, and after 6 years service, left to join a research team at the Queen Mary Hospital.

Yuen Kwok-yung became the Scientific co-director between the HKU-Pasteur Research Centre and the University of Hong Kong in 2000.

Yuen Kwok-yung has led his team in the discovery of other disease agents, such as the novel Human coronavirus HKU1, bat coronavirus HKU2 to HKU13, Laribacter hongkongensis and many other bacteria named after Hong Kong or China.

Yuen Kwok-yung is currently the Chair of Infectious Disease at the Department of Microbiology of the University of Hong Kong.

Yuen Kwok-yung is a member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

Yuen Kwok-yung is involved in the research on SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic.

Yuen Kwok-yung was an early advocate of wearing masks even by healthy individuals, citing asymptomatic cases and a large number of virus strands in saliva of an infected person.

Yuen Kwok-yung claimed that he alerted mainland health officials on 12 January 2020 to suspected human-to-human transmission of SARS-CoV-2.

Yuen Kwok-yung was one of the lead authors of an article in Clinical Infections Diseases, published in August 2020, which described the first proven case of a COVID-19 reinfection of a patient with a different strain of SARS-CoV-2.

On 6 December 2020, during the fourth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Hong Kong, Yuen Kwok-yung said that the wave had been expected and urged the public to remain vigilant with regard to social contacts on Christmas.

Yuen Kwok-yung ascribed the transmission to the use of valve masks, which he called "selfish" by design as they did not filter the exhaled air, which he said was "not good".

On 29 November 2021, a team led by Yuen Kwok-yung succeeded in isolating the Omicron variant.

On 19 January 2022, Yuen Kwok-yung published a statement justifying the culling of 2,000 hamsters by the Hong Kong government sparking backlash from animal rights activist groups.

On 23 January 2022, Yuen Kwok-yung warned that if a recent outbreak with the Omicron variant in Kwai Chung Estate with over 100 cases failed to be contained, this could result in that outbreak to last up to three months and to have a major impact on businesses.

Yuen Kwok-yung reiterated his earlier statements that the SARS-CoV-2 virus was there to stay, and questioned the heavy focus of the government on zero coronavirus cases; the zero-Covid policy should be considered as a means to "buy time" to increase the vaccination rate, not as a way for anti-pandemic measures to end.

In relation to Chief Executive Carrie Lam having removed her mask after taking her seat at a press briefing a day earlier, Yuen Kwok-yung assessed the risk of transmission in that situation as low but urged experts and leaders to "set an example" themselves by wearing a mask, as he himself would wear two.

Yuen Kwok-yung's team commented on the fact that Covid-19 cannot be cleared completely, and the government should shift their priority from lowering cases to boosting vaccination rates to achieve hybrid-immunity.