Covid patients are being forced to wait outside hospitals in Hong Kong gripped by a surge in Omicron infections.
A record 6,600 daily cases were recorded in the city on Friday which is the highest figure since the start of the pandemic.
Harrowing videos show patients waiting on stretchers outside Caritas Hospital in Kowloon while ambulances arrive at the kerb.
Emergency room waiting times have reached as high as eight hours at around 11 public hospitals which are working beyond capacity, reports the Daily Star.
Hong Kong launched its "Covid zero" plan in a bid to tackle the spread of Covid, shutting its borders and announcing a 21-day quarantine for returning travellers.
In January, authorities announced they were going to cull 2,000 hamsters after a Covid cluster were traced back to a pet shop worker.
But the tough measures appear to have backfired after the government failed to keep cases from spiralling.
Footage posted on a Facebook group show doctors and nurses going back and forth to the A&E department covered in protective clothing.
Residents are seen queueing around a building for a Covid rapid test in another clip shared by local resident Po Sang.
People waited for up to two hours in the enormous queue desperate to get tested, according to reports.
Hospital beds reached 90 per cent capacity amid a policy which saw every positive case hospitalised regardless of symptoms, it is understood.
Government facilities were provided where people had to isolate offsite if they had come into close contact with those infected.
The average number of new infections in Hong Kong has reached a new high at 2,940 per day, according to the latest data.
Since the start of the pandemic, it has recorded 40,700 cases and 240 Covid related deaths.
Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor confirmed that around 100 million rapid test kits had been procured, South China Morning Post reports.
She said the administration must now focus on the fight against coronavirus, announcing that the chief executive elections will be moved from March to May 8.
