Mainland, Hong Kong agree to implement 'three easy' principles in fighting COVID-19, says mainland medical expert

HONG KONG -- Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) experts from the Chinese mainland and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government have agreed to put forward the "three easy" principles and formulate "four plans" in the battle against COVID-19, a mainland expert said.

Hong Kong has been hit by the fifth wave of COVID-19 since January this year. A team of TCM experts, led by Tong Xiaolin, an academician with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, was dispatched by the central authorities to the global financial hub at the request of the HKSAR government.

The team arrived in Hong Kong on March 29 and immediately started anti-COVID-19 work. They had full communication with local health authorities and visited different units, including designated hospitals, community treatment facilities, elderly homes, TCM clinics and organizations, local universities, and gained a deeper understanding of the TCM role in Hong Kong's fight against COVID-19, Tong told Xinhua on Thursday.

He said the expert team reached a consensus with the HKSAR government to focus on reducing deaths, severe cases and infections, addressing infection risks in key groups of people, premises and organizations by taking precise and effective measures, and giving priority to the elderly. The "three easy" principles - "easy to understand", "easy to do" and "easy to get" - will be followed.

Tong said "easy to understand" means to let people know how to correctly choose and use proprietary TCM; "easy to do" means to unify TCM treatment plans in community isolation facilities so as to facilitate training and promotion among TCM staff; "easy to get" means to enrich TCM information and service networks, making the information, medicines and services more accessible.

Besides, the mainland experts will help Hong Kong's TCM sector to formulate "four plans", which covers the use of proprietary TCM at home, TCM diagnosis, TCM rehabilitation, and TCM prevention and treatment.

Tong said the HKSAR government and the TCM industry have worked together to expand the popularization and application of TCM, enabling it to play an important role in combating COVID-19.

Also, the HKSAR government had taken extraordinary measures and made many effective breakthroughs, including exempting the registration of prescription rights for medical teams from the mainland, exempting the registration of a variety of proprietary TCM donated by the mainland for use in Hong Kong, and enhancing traditional Chinese and Western medicine collaboration in COVID-19 treatment in Hong Kong, he said.

Tong said that mainland experts will continue to maintain communication with the HKSAR government and work with all walks of life in Hong Kong to fight the outbreak. Looking ahead, he suggested that Hong Kong should promote the TCM to play a better role in epidemic prevention, enrich the strength of TCM departments, improve TCM management institutions, and further improve the overall coordination capacity.

In addition, the HKSAR government should, on the basis of the existing team of TCM practitioners, fill the gap in the integration of traditional Chinese and Western medicine, establish a national TCM research center for infectious diseases in Hong Kong, and set up a clinical and scientific research system featuring tropical infectious diseases, he said.