Director of Health Ronald Lam on Sunday said this year is expected to be a peak for chikungunya fever, warning that Hong Kong may see local transmissions if infections continue to emerge in surrounding areas.

Lam said local transmissions could also occur if mosquito control measures are not well implemented, but he believes the city has sufficient testing capabilities to deal with a potential local outbreak.

He noted that public hospitals are introducing tests for the chikungunya virus, and that the Government Laboratory can test more than 100 samples per day.

His remarks came as Hong Kong recorded its fifth imported case of chikungunya fever this year.

“From the perspective of a global epidemic, there are outbreaks of chikungunya fever at regular intervals,” Lam said on a TVB programme.

“For example, an outbreak occurred from 2004 to 2005 which caused over 500,000 infections globally. The World Health Organization has predicted that this year will be another peak for the disease.”

Lam said the chikungunya virus has yet to be found among local mosquitoes as of last month, but authorities are not letting their guard down in its disease-prevention work. He also warned that chikungunya can spread faster than dengue fever, another mosquito-borne disease.

“It has a much shorter incubation period in mosquitoes. This means the virus duplicates faster among mosquitoes and is likely to infect more people,” he said.

On identifying imported cases, Lam said health officials may not always be able to detect such cases at border checkpoints as the disease’s incubation period could be as long as 12 days.

Therefore, it is necessary to enhance education for inbound travellers so that they will continue to monitor for any symptoms after entering Hong Kong, he added.