Hong Kong and mainland China have cooperated on healthcare – but new partnership is no instant cure

Tension between Hong Kong and the mainland was high in 2003 after the deadly outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars). An infected professor, who worked at a Guangzhou hospital, spread the respiratory virus to guests at the Kowloon hotel where he was staying and on to medical staff who treated him. Hospitals, doctors and nurses were among the first to suffer in an epidemic that infected 1,755 and claimed 299 lives in the city. As health control measures were tightened at the border...