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| As Virus Spreads, Hong Kong Puts Major Limits on Border With Mainland | |
| (about 1 hour later) | |
| HONG KONG — Carrie Lam, Hong Kong’s top official, said on Tuesday that the city would sharply cut the number of visitors from mainland China in an effort to control the spread of the new coronavirus that emerged in the city of Wuhan last month. | HONG KONG — Carrie Lam, Hong Kong’s top official, said on Tuesday that the city would sharply cut the number of visitors from mainland China in an effort to control the spread of the new coronavirus that emerged in the city of Wuhan last month. |
| The limits, including the closure of rail and ferry service and reducing flight arrivals by about half, will begin in the first minute of Thursday morning. They follow days of increasing pressure from health care workers, epidemiologists and even pro-Beijing politicians who have traditionally supported Mrs. Lam’s government. And they are unprecedented, Hong Kong scholars say, avoided even during the height of the SARS epidemic in 2003. | |
| Hong Kong will close several of its border crossing points and increase checkpoints to detect fevers at those that remain, Mrs. Lam said. China will also stop issuing visas for individual travelers from the mainland, which make up about half of visitors to Hong Kong, she added. | Hong Kong will close several of its border crossing points and increase checkpoints to detect fevers at those that remain, Mrs. Lam said. China will also stop issuing visas for individual travelers from the mainland, which make up about half of visitors to Hong Kong, she added. |
| Hong Kong has eight confirmed cases of the coronavirus, all of which came from mainland China. | Hong Kong has eight confirmed cases of the coronavirus, all of which came from mainland China. |
| Hong Kong is one of Asia’s biggest transportation and financial centers. The cuts to mainland visitors represent a drastic escalation of concerns over the risks posed by the coronavirus, which has infected more than 4,500 people and killed 106, all of them in China. | Hong Kong is one of Asia’s biggest transportation and financial centers. The cuts to mainland visitors represent a drastic escalation of concerns over the risks posed by the coronavirus, which has infected more than 4,500 people and killed 106, all of them in China. |
| Mrs. Lam, who wore a face mask during the news conference, thanked China’s central government and local mainland authorities in helping plan for the closures. | |
| She had previously dismissed calls to limit mainland arrivals, calling it “inappropriate and impractical” on Saturday. But on Sunday, she took a first step, barring residents of Hubei Province, the center of the outbreak, or anyone who had visited in the previous two weeks. |