Mainland Prostitutes in Hong Kong During Diagnosis, Nearly 100 People Picked Up Clients, Difficulty Tracing Their Origin

A prostitute from mainland China who contracted neo-coronary pneumonia while still receiving clients in Hong Kong is pictured here in a hotel where the woman received clients.

A 42-year-old prostitute, who was arrested on Oct. 28 during an anti-vice operation, has been diagnosed with neocoronary pneumonia while awaiting repatriation, according to reports.

According to Apple Daily and Hong Kong 01, the woman, who is of the same sex as He, is from Guizhou. She claimed to have entered Hong Kong illegally in mid-August on a speedboat in Zhuhai via waterway. The report said that the woman, who was smuggled into Hong Kong to work as a prostitute, was receiving an average of several clients a day and had been receiving clients in a Mongkok hotel as well as a building in Tai Wai during the 14 days before she fell ill, and that police were trying to track down nearly 100 clients to prevent an outbreak of the group.

Last Wednesday (October 28), the Mongkok Police District and the Immigration Department conducted a joint anti-vice operation, raiding a room in Mongkok’s Oriental Pantai Hotel and arresting Ms. Ho after the hotel manager opened the door. She was first detained at the Mongkok Police Station and then transferred to the Castle Peak Bay Immigration Center last Friday. On that day, she had a sore throat, and was placed in isolation with six other new detainees at the center and a deep throat saliva sample was taken for virus testing. By the evening of October 31, her diagnosis was confirmed. The source of the infection is unknown.

The police are using computer tracing, inspecting places visited by the patients and so-called prostitutes’ buildings, as well as checking CCTV footage, tracing phone records and contacting “chicken heads” to track down people who have had contact with the patients, including clients of prostitutes, and to remind them to undergo testing in order to prevent a cluster outbreak.

In a radio program this morning, the Director of the Center for Infectious Diseases at the University of Hong Kong, Dr. Robert Ho, said that it is difficult to trace people who have been involved in illegal activities around the patients, as well as clients who do not want their identities to be revealed. The report, which was published in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHSHS), said that the government’s response to the report was “not to reveal the identity of the prostitute, but to reveal the identity of the client.

A prostitution ring set up a channel on social media Telegram, using pictures of “Double Fly Super Sisters” as avatars to openly solicit clients. The ring is suspected of renting several hotel rooms for prostitution, including the Eastern Panda Hotel, where a patient was diagnosed, and a hotel in North Point.