Concern groups say elderly residents will struggle to navigate new dual-colour coded system to be introduced as upgrade to ‘Leave Home Safe’ app. Many older residents do not own smartphones, according to Sze Lai-shan, deputy director of the Society for Community Organisation. — SCMP
Elderly Hongkongers who are poor and digitally illiterate will face difficulties using a new health code system for identifying coronavirus-positive patients, concern groups have warned, as more than one in four such residents still do not own smartphones.
Secretary for Health Lo Chung-mau on Monday revealed the government would adopt the system, a new feature to be added to the city’s “Leave Home Safe” Covid-19 risk-exposure app, under which infected residents quarantining at home will be issued a red health code.
Inbound travellers, who could later be allowed to undergo part of their week-long quarantine at home rather than spending all seven days at a designated hotel, will be issued a yellow code. Both groups will be barred from visiting high-risk areas.
Though details of the planned upgrade have yet to be rolled out, some concern groups said it could be challenging to navigate for many elderly residents, who were already struggling to use the app.
Sze Lai-shan, deputy director of the Society for Community Organisation (SoCO), said it would be difficult for the elderly and homeless to adapt to the dual-colour coded system, as many did not own a smartphone or were not adept at operating such devices.
According to Sze, hundreds of homeless residents do not have access to a smartphone, while the number for elderly Hongkongers was in the hundreds of thousands, with many not knowing how to use apps or even their phones.
“It will be hard for (the elderly) to use and even read the code itself,” Sze said. “A paper version of the code will make things easier, but those who are too old or have eyesight problems will still need help.”
Sze suggested ramping up community help around the city and introducing a policy that exempted the elderly from the upgrade.
According to the Census and Statistics Department’s Thematic Household Survey Report released in May, nearly one million people aged 65 and above owned a smartphone in 2021, accounting for 73% of the total elderly population, up from 68.1% a year earlier.
Experts and social workers said the surge in phone ownership was mainly due to the mandatory use of the Leave Home Safe app to enter various premises including restaurants and government facilities.
But the remaining 27% or about 370,000 elderly people did not own a smartphone.
Many elderly residents flocked to buy smartphones after the launch of the app, while some organisations donated such devices to the underprivileged.
Wong Siu-wai, senior social work supervisor at NGO Caritas Community Development Service, said although more elderly people owned smartphones, many still faced difficulties using the device and the app without help.
Aside from a lack of digital awareness, poor eyesight and clumsy fingers also made it hard for them to navigate a small screen, she said.
She added that she expected similar challenges for underprivileged elderly residents after the launch of the new health code.
“It is hard for elderly people to adapt to new things. It will depend on how user-friendly the health code system is,” she said, urging the government to consult residents as well as concern groups when designing the system to remove any hurdles.
Ivan Lin Wai-kiu, a community organiser at SoCO, said he was concerned over the potential scale of inconvenience and panic the coming policy change could bring, citing his experience helping the elderly register for a Hong Kong health code released last year for residents to comply with mainland Chinese pandemic control standards when travelling across the border.
“Even if the elderly have a phone, a staggering digital gap remains. Before we even talk about the red or yellow codes, registering for the vaccine pass was already difficult for many elderly residents,” Lin said.
Frontline staff at SoCO received nearly 100 pleas for help when the mainland-compatible Hong Kong health code was released last December.
Lin said the number of calls for help was overwhelming for his frontline colleagues, and he was worried that the new system’s real-name registration function could lead to many requests for assistance.
The potential for complicated, recurring logins under the latest policy change would make it difficult for the elderly to use the system. Meanwhile, insufficient avenues for help posed another problem.
Lin called on authorities to set up more spots offering guidance around the city, in places such as post offices to government-run elderly service centres and even MTR stations, with digital ambassadors stationed at checkpoints to help residents.
Communication from the government on how to navigate the coming updates should also be improved, Lin said.
He added that he had already seen some panic among the elderly over the system, as they worried about how and when to register.
“As the government hikes the digital threshold for its policy, it is worth asking if the difficulties presented would alienate some of the more reclusive elderly residents from social life,” Lin said.
The Post has contacted the Health Bureau for comment. – South China Morning Post
