Hong Kong Chief Executive Tung Chee Hwa and Secretary for Health, Welfare & Food Yeoh Eng-kiong on Monday expressed their deepest regret at the death of a hospital doctor who succumbed to SARS Sunday night.
Chief Executive Tung Chee Hwa very grieved over Dr. Cheng Ha-yan's death, saying that "she had demonstrated the highest level of dedication, devotion and profession in looking after patients."
"I join the community to extend our deepest condolences to her family," Tung said.
Dr. Cheng Ha-yan, who worked in the department of medicine and geriatrics, contracted the disease while taking care of a SARS patient who did not show any symptoms of the disease.
She was admitted to hospital on April 21 and was transferred to intensive care on April 28.
SARS has made great suffering in Hong Kong over the past two and a half months. Over 282 people were killed and 1,742 were contracted, including 384 health care workers. Dr. Cheng was the eighth and the youngest front-line health care worker to be killed by the disease in Hong Kong.
On Dr. Cheng's death, Chief Secretary Donald Tsang said the government will try every means to help the family.
Secretary for Health, Welfare & Food Yeoh Eng-kiong said he was saddened by the loss of a dedicated doctor who had given her life saving patients.
"My deepest condolences go to her family at this sad moment," he added.
(Xinhua News Agency June 3, 2003)
