Hong Kong – Hong Kong Housing Authority approves estimated public rental housing allocation for 2024-25
Hong Kong Housing Authority approves estimated public rental housing allocation for 2024-25
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The following is issued on behalf of the Hong Kong Housing Authority:
The Subsidised Housing Committee of the Hong Kong Housing Authority (HA) today (June 13) approved the estimated public rental housing (PRH) allocation for 2024-25 and noted the actual allocation in 2023-24.
“For the year 2023-24, the actual allocation was 23 598 flats (i.e. the number of flats taken up by applicants before the end of 2023-24), representing 97.9 per cent of the original estimate. As individual projects undertaken by Aggressive Construction Company Limited were not completed as scheduled, the number of newly completed flats was 4 500 less than the original estimate. As a result of the Housing Department’s continuous efforts in taking enhanced measures to combat abuse of public housing resources, together with the intake of new subsidised sale flats, the number of recovered flats was about 4 100 more than the original estimate of 15 600,” a spokesman for the HA said.
“For 2024-25, we estimated that a total of about 30 200 PRH flats, comprising about 11 100 new flats and about 19 100 recovered flats, will be available for allocation to various categories of applicants. Most of the flats (i.e. 23 300 flats (77.2 per cent)) will be allocated to PRH applicants. The annual allocation quota for non-elderly one-person applicants under the Quota and Points System (QPS) is set at 10 per cent of the total number of flats to be allocated to PRH applicants with an upper limit of 2 200 flats, and therefore the allocation quota for QPS applicants in 2024-25 is 2 200 flats,” the spokesman said.
As regards allocation for other categories of applicants, the HA will reserve 1 200 flats for rehousing residents affected by clearance projects planned by various departments, and residents affected by other Government’s squatter clearances, emergency clearances, unauthorised rooftop structure clearances and so forth. Moreover, 300 flats will also be set aside for rehousing residents affected by the Urban Renewal Authority’s redevelopment projects scheduled for 2024-25.
In addition, 700 flats will be reserved for allocation under the category of Compassionate Rehousing (CR). This figure is not an upper limit and the HA will follow the established policy to handle all the demands for CR as recommended by the Social Welfare Department. Any unused flats reserved under the category of CR will be allocated to PRH applicants.
Under the category of Transfers, 3 700 flats will be used for various transfer purposes in 2024-25, among which 1 100 flats will be used for the transfer of under-occupation households so that more large flats can be recovered for easing the pressing demand of applicants with four or more household members. Moeover, as with last year, the HA will reserve a quota of around 1 000 for the Transfer Scheme for Improving the Living Environment in 2024-25. The remaining 1 600 flats will be flexibly deployed for other transfer purposes including Special Transfer, the Harmonious Families Transfer Scheme, the Full Rent Exemption Scheme for Elderly Households, Management Transfer, etc.
For the category of Junior Civil Servants and Pensioners, as in 2023-24, the HA will reserve 1 000 flats under the Civil Service Public Housing Quota Scheme in 2024-25.
“The HA will make projections of the supply of PRH flats that can be allocated in the coming year and how such flats may be allocated to the various categories of demands. We will closely monitor any changes in the circumstances and will maintain flexibility in the allocation of PRH flats to optimise the use of resources,” the spokesman added.
(Please refer to the attached table on the breakdown of estimated allocations for various categories in 2024-25.)
Hospital Authority announces senior appointment (with photo)
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The Hospital Authority (HA) spokesperson announced the following senior appointment today (May 30):
Dr So Wing-yee will be appointed as Hospital Chief Executive (HCE) of North District Hospital with effect from tomorrow (May 31).
Dr So is a specialist in endocrinology, diabetes and metabolism by background. She is an experienced senior executive and clinical leader with a strong background in healthcare management at both the corporate and cluster levels. Dr So is currently the HCE of Bradbury Hospice, Cheshire Home, Shatin (SCH) and Shatin Hospital (SH), as well as the Clinical Stream Coordinator (Medicine) of the New Territories East Cluster (NTEC). She has achieved notable accomplishments in recent years in driving improvements in patient care in the NTEC, such as shortening medicine specialist outpatient clinic waiting times, as well as implementing the 24-hour Primary Percutaneous Coronary Intervention and Chimeric Antigen Receptor T-cell Therapy services. In addition, Dr So promulgated Advanced Care Planning (ACP) among infirmary patients in the SCH and pioneered a “Co-Care” model for geriatric patients with traumatic head injury in SH. She has also effectively mobilised community resources to support hospital service development and played a significant role in the review of the NTEC Clinical Service Plan.
The HA Chairman, Mr Henry Fan, and Chief Executive, Dr Tony Ko, congratulate Dr So on her new appointment and wish her every success in taking up the new role.
Hospital Authority expands the Integrated Chinese-Western Medicine services to 53 hospital sites
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Hospital Authority welcomes 2024-25 Budget
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The Hospital Authority (HA) Chairman, Mr Henry Fan, welcomed the 2024-25 Budget announced by the Financial Secretary, Mr Paul Chan, at the Legislative Council today (February 28). The 2024-25 annual subvention for the HA will be $95.4 billion (including $93.5 billion recurrent), having increased by 2 per cent compared to the 2023-24 revised provision.
Mr Fan was particularly grateful for the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Government’s increased subvention to the HA to enhance public healthcare services despite facing pressure on public finances. “With the immense support from our country and the HKSAR Government, the HA continues to strengthen its services, and provides suitable treatment and care to patients. Last year, the HA has launched a number of new services and programmes. For example, the Ambulatory Diagnostic Radiology Service Pilot Programme and other healthcare services at the Central Government Aided Emergency Hospital, which shortened the waiting time of patients significantly. Also, the HA also rolled out the Greater Bay Area Healthcare Talents Visiting Programmes and the Global Healthcare Talent Scheme, which attracted healthcare talents to serve in Hong Kong. The HA will continue to provide healthcare services that suit citizens’ convenience and needs.”
The HA will step up its efforts in promoting the sustainable development of public healthcare, including introducing smart hospitals initiatives in different clusters, enhancing tele-health and drug delivery services in specialist out-patient clinics (SOPCs), and improving patients’ experience and operational flow with advanced technology. At the same time, the HA will enhance SOPCs service, including nurse and pharmacist led clinic service, thereby providing more treatment choices to patients.
Mr Fan also thanked the Government for supporting the HA in coping with manpower attrition. The HA will continue to adopt multi-pronged measures to attract local healthcare talents and those from different places to join and serve in public hospitals. Besides, the HA will actively develop and retain talents through various measures. The HA had already established the HA Academy last year, in order to provide systematic training to its staff, striving to enhance multidisciplinary care, support the need of service expansion, and fostering staff’s professional development.
The HA Chief Executive, Dr Tony Ko, also expressed his gratitude to the HKSAR Government for the support on service enhancement of public hospitals. “The HA will continue to actively press ahead with different hospital redevelopment and expansion projects, and various minor works projects in hospitals, so as to enhance the service capacity of public hospitals in tandem with the continuous growth in service demand for public healthcare services.”
“Besides, public hospitals will open around 150 additional hospital beds in the next financial year, provide additional operating theatre sessions, Computer Tomography Scans and endoscopy sessions, and increase general out-patient clinic attendances. The HA is also grateful that the Government promotes the development of Chinese Medicine (CM), including by increasing the quota of government-subsidised CM out-patient services and extending integrated Chinese-Western medicine services.”
In life-threatening diseases management, the HA will continue to strengthen its support to cancer patients, including enhancing chemotherapy and radiation therapy services. Cardiovascular diseases and neuroscience services will be also strengthened in order to provide multidisciplinary professional support. Meanwhile, resources will be reserved for the development of robotic-arm assisted systems for joint replacement surgery and angiography. Also, support to psychiatric patients will be strengthened by reinforcing the psychiatric in-patients service and recruiting more case managers to take care of the patients in the community.
The HA will continue to develop personalised treatment service for patients in need, including the provision of faecal microbiota transplantation service for suitable patients with clostridium difficile infection. The HA will also enhance the genetic services, and continue to support the establishment of the Uncommon Disorders Registry, in order to better support the concerned patients.
Mr Fan and Dr Ko once again thanked the HKSAR Government’s support to public healthcare services. The HA will utilise the subvention appropriately and strive to implement relevant policies and measures for the benefit of patients.
Hospital Authority reminds members of public to stay alert to fraudulent calls
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The spokesperson of the Hospital Authority (HA) today (December 1) reminds members of the public to stay alert to fraudulent calls.
Hong Kong – Hospital Authority announces senior appointment (with photo)
The following is issued on behalf of the Hospital Authority.Hong Kong – Hospital Authority expands the Integrated Chinese-Western Medicine services to 53 hospital sites
The following is issued on behalf of the Hospital Authority:
The Hospital Authority (HA) announced today (March 14) that the Integrated Chinese-Western Medicine (ICWM) services have been further expanded to 26 public hospitals under the seven clusters in the first quarter of 2024 and adding up the hospital sites from eight to 53 (at the Annex). Such expansion is in line with the policy direction set forth in the Policy Address that to promote long-term development of Chinese medicine (CM) and enhance ICWM services in providing services to patients under the designated disease areas (including stroke care, musculoskeletal pain management, cancer palliative care and cancer care pilot programme).
The Chief Manager (Chinese Medicine) of the HA, Ms Rowena Wong, stated, “Since 2014, the HA has been implementing the ICWM pilot programme by phases with a view to gather relevant operational experience. With the staunch support of the Government, the ICWM services have gained substantial results and reaching its periodical milestone. The ICWM services have been regularised since early last year and further extended to cover more hospital sites and disease areas, offering patients additional treatment options for leveraging the advantages of CM and ICWM. The HA will continue to explore the feasibility of extending the ICWM services to cover more disease areas, such as elderly degenerative diseases and respiratory diseases, which would benefit to a greater number of patients.”
The Chief of Service of the Department of Medicine of Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Dr Fong Wing-chi, said, “Stroke patients face many challenges on their treatment and recovery journey. The Western medicine medical team welcomes the participation of CM practitioners in jointly assessing and providing treatment for the patients, believing that such arrangement will offer help to suitable patients participating in the programme. Western medicine and CM experts collaborate in formulating clinical treatment plans and have regular case discussions. With close collaboration, both medical teams will have more experiences in ICWM consultations. With the experience accumulated, it certainly will benefit the future development of the ICWM services in terms of its application and coverage of disease areas.”
The Senior CM practitioner at the Pok Oi Hospital-Hong Kong Baptist University Chinese Medicine Clinic cum Training and Research Centre (Yau Tsim Mong District), Mr Yau Kin-chung, said that traditional CM services in Hong Kong have primarily been outpatient-based. The ICWM model developed by the HA provides opportunities for authorised participating CM practitioners to review patients’ clinical data and reports. Such arrangement helps the CM practitioners obtain a comprehensive understanding of the patients’ conditions in which facilitating their formulation of the clinical treatment plans. Joint management of patients by the two medical teams under ICWM services can also promote multi-disciplinary knowledge exchanges and drive the service development, enabling patients to receive more comprehensive treatment and care.
The ICWM services target eligible individuals aged 18 and above, who have been assessed by both the Western Medicine and CM teams at designated public hospital sites and considered suitable with fulfilling the programme criteria. Participation is voluntary, and the participation does not affect patients’ original treatment plans at the hospitals. With the funding support by the Government, patients receiving this service only need to pay a fee of $120 for each attendance of ICWM inpatient services (not including general fees for public hospital services), while Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients will be fully waived for the service fees under the programme.
The HA expresses gratitude to the Government for the steadfast support on the development of ICWM services, and will dedicatedly develop an evidence-based and sustainable ICWM model in Hong Kong. In future, the HA will make effort to explore opportunities for further development of ICWM, leveraging the professional advantages of both sides to enhance treatment effectiveness so as to provide patients with more appropriate medical services. The HA will continue to devote its efforts in aligning with the national policy initiatives in promoting the high-quality development of CM in Hong Kong on all fronts with an aim to achieve the internationalisation of ICWM experience. Hong Kong – Hospital Authority welcomes 2024-25 Budget
The following is issued on behalf of the Hospital Authority:Hong Kong – Hospital Authority reminds members of public to stay alert to fraudulent calls
The following is issued on behalf of the Hospital Authority:
The HA received a report from the Prince of Wales Hospital (PWH) today, which PWH was informed by members of the public that they received calls claiming to be calling from the PWH. The call was in the form of pre-recorded messages requesting the recipient to follow instructions to collect a document. The PWH has reported to the Police.
The HA reiterates that hospital staff will contact patients by phone in person and provide relevant information to verify the identity of both parties. Members of the public are advised not to disclose personal information in unidentified phone calls and to report any suspected fraudulent calls to the Police.
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