Police in the city have warned they will deal with pet lovers who try to stop people giving up their hamsters to be put down or offer to care for them.
Hong Kong ordered the killing of nearly 2,000 animals, including hamsters, after several tested positive for Covid at a pet shop in the Causeway Bay district.
The loveable rodents had been imported from the Netherlands, according to reports, while an employee at the pet shop also tested positive.
Under a tough ‘zero Covid’ strategy, authorities ordered anyone who purchased a hamster after December 22 to hand over their pet to be killed.
The Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department (AFCD) said any effort to try to save hamsters would be dealt with, even if that meant calling in the law.
"If the people concerned continue with such action, or fail to return the hamsters taken away, the AFCD will stringently follow up and hand it over to the police for handling," said the department, which has also advised people not to kiss pets.
Pet lovers have gathered outside pet collection facilities to urge people to not hand over their hamsters, while others have offered to falsify receipts to date before December 22, to avoid the cull, according to reports.
One, a woman who gave her name as Jessica, told the Guardian that she had volunteered to house a hamster because she would rather have Covid than allow it to die.
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She said she wasn’t scared of police threats. “I don’t care about that, the police … They arrest people anyway for doing nothing,” she said.
“Some of my friends are in jail now. Not because of a hamster. I would rather save a life. A hamster life is still a life and that’s what a lot of volunteers are thinking.”
According to government figures, by Thursday only 68 hamsters had been handed over by the public.
Hong Kong’s Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals said it was "shocked and concerned" by the decision to kill the animals.
While the government has reportedly conceded that it does not have proof of domestic animals passing the disease onto humans, it has said that it must act out of caution.
