Members of Hong Kong’s philharmonic orchestra were headed into quarantine on Tuesday after a player tested positive for the coronavirus days after the city’s leader attended a concert.
The financial hub’s most prestigious ensemble confirmed that one of its musicians had tested preliminary positive and said members were going into mandatory isolation.
“I am being (taken) to a government quarantine camp with no WiFi for 2 weeks,” principal clarinet Andrew Simon wrote a post on Facebook which named the infected colleague.
It was unclear how many orchestra members were following him into isolation.
But the news quickly lit up social media because the orchestra played a concert on Friday night — its first in months — attended by chief executive Carrie Lam.
In a statement, Lam’s office said she wore a face mask, did not communicate with any musicians and was seated far away from the orchestra.
Lam is currently in the neighbouring mainland city of Shenzhen where she will attend a ceremony on Wednesday alongside Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The coronavirus has killed more than a million people across the globe since it first emerged in China late last year.
Hong Kong has maintained strict and economically painful social distancing measures for most of this year.
Over 5,200 infections have been reported in the city, most in a third wave over the summer months, with 105 fatalities.
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