China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) on Wednesday reported 62 new COVID-19 cases, double the figure registered the previous day, according to the HKSAR government's Center for Health Protection.

Since the recurrence of local infections on July 5, the Asian financial hub has seen a surge in the number of COVID-19 cases. It took nearly three months for the total number of confirmed cases in Hong Kong to go from zero to 1,000, another three months to exceed 2,000, but under two weeks to reach 3,000.

Though the HKSAR government has introduced several rounds of stringent measures, the rapid increase in COVID-19 cases has put Hong Kong's hospital system and medical materials under great strain. 

In keeping with the slogan "Together, we fight COVID-19" that has been seen on many occasions in HK society, the central government has been paying great attention to the epidemic situation in the city and has pledged all necessary support for Hong Kong at the request of the HKSAR government.

Keywords: Testing capacity, medical resources, boundary control

Timely support from the central government has been quickly launched from three aspects. 

As the testing capacity for COVID-19 is critical during the fight against the virus, enabling more people in HK to get tested becomes an urgent task.

On August 2, the first batch of seven virus testing professionals from the Chinese mainland, members of a 60-strong nucleic acid testing team established recently at the HKSAR government's request, arrived in Hong Kong.

On August 7, the HKSAR government said the city's testing capacity would be substantially boosted to as many as 500,000 samples per day after the Hong Kong labs of three national-level testing service providers are ready.

Meanwhile, the Hong Kong Volunteers Federation has announced to send about 10,000 volunteers to assist the mainland teams in logistics work in the city.

To alleviate the demand for isolation beds in public hospitals, the HKSAR government has opened a 500-bed makeshift hospital at the Asia World-Expo near Hong Kong International Airport and a community isolation facility at Lei Yue Mun Park and Holiday Village.

The National Health Commission has set up a panel of six experts from Wuhan to provide technical support in transforming the expo site into a makeshift hospital, and the central government has provided 400 hospital beds and other related equipment to help advance the installation of Pavilion 2 of the expo as soon as possible.

In the first half of this year, the mainland exported six categories of anti-epidemic materials to HK, including masks, protective clothing, ventilators, thermometers, testing reagents and goggles, totaling 470 million U.S. dollars, 1.3 times compared with the same period last year, according to China's Ministry of Commerce.

Efforts were also made to stabilize the food supply in the Hong Kong market during the pandemic. Currently, the mainland has provided about 85 percent of the live animals, 90 percent of the vegetables and 60 percent of the aquatic products for the Hong Kong market.

As the virus situation in HK worsens, city officials and officials from Guangdong, which borders Hong Kong in the north, have been working together to curb the spread of the virus.

Since July 17, people who travel from Hong Kong to Shenzhen and Zhuhai in Guangdong Province have been required to present valid negative COVID-19 nucleic acid test results issued by a testing institution recognized by the local governments and undergo a 14-day medical quarantine.

Public health over politics

While the mainland and Hong Kong are doing everything they can to fight against the pandemic, false accusations, arrogance and prejudice from some opposition forces emerge, with excuses such as "mainland healthcare professionals cannot communicate in English" "such practices are not in compliance with local regulations and codes of practice" or even the claim that mainland testing firms "may spread the pandemic" in Hong Kong.

In a face-to-face interview with China Daily, Lo Chung-mau, hospital chief executive at the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital, which also participated in the aid program, refuted allegations that those mainland experts will collect DNA samples during the tests and send them to the mainland.

He noted the tests can collect only RNA samples, and all the tests will be conducted in HK.

Noting there won't be a language barrier as most technicians can speak Cantonese, Lo said that the standards and procedures of virus tests are the same in Hong Kong and the mainland.

During an interview with CGTN, HK lawyer Eliza Chan, also Hong Kong representative to China's top political advisory body, echoed that public health and safety are top priorities and should always be put above politics and that smearing remarks should be strongly condemned.

A spokesperson of the Liaison Office of the Central People's Government in the HKSAR also criticized that it is "shocking and shameful" that a small number of people in Hong Kong put the lives of the general public at risk by trying to sabotage cooperation between the SAR and the mainland in the fight, using various excuses.

Meanwhile, the HK society calls for unity instead of false accusations and blaming others. An alliance jointly established by 42 Hong Kong political groups, social organizations and business chambers on Sunday appealed to the whole society to set aside differences and make concerted efforts to fight COVID-19 and support the HKSAR government in leading Hong Kong out of difficulties.

As for the question, how does "fighting together" defeat politicization?

The answer can be found in history and will be proved again in HK's fight against the pandemic. Since Hong Kong's return, whether it was the Asian financial crisis in 1997, SARS in 2003, the international financial crisis in 2008 and the COVID-19 pandemic, Hong Kong compatriots and people on the mainland have stood together and supported each other.

(Cover: Hong Kong residents warmly welcome the nucleic acid testing team from the mainland. /CCTV)