[4][5][6] The stabbed police officer, Wai Ming underwent seven hours of surgery in the emergency room while his family was told they needed to prepare themselves for the worst.

[27][28] The police found a large number of Apple Daily newspaper clippings, social movement propaganda leaflets, books, notes, and a USB memory card belonging to the deceased, which contained suicide notes declaring his hatred of police and his intention to kill an officer on July 1 which marked the 24th anniversary of Hong Kong's return to Chinese sovereignty,[27][29] and explaining the settling of his financial affairs.

The national security law, which the central government pushed through during a lull in the protests caused by the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic,[8] changed the climate in the city fundamentally.

[8] On 1 July 2021, the day of the stabbing, protests were again banned, ostensibly due to the COVID-19 pandemic,[8] and this time suppressed through a large citywide deployment of police, including water cannon trucks and armoured vehicles, as well as the stopping and searching of passers-by.

[8] The New York Times noted that the event, along with the foiled bomb plot several days later, was reopening an uncomfortable debate within the pro-democracy movement about whether it condoned or even supported violence – a question that had already dogged the protests in 2019.

[11] In a statement on 2 July which made reference to these online comments, the Hong Kong police warned the public against any "attempt to romanticize or glorify the despicable act with seditious intent to incite hatred in society.

Over the following week, and in spite of a warning by Hong Kong police that encouraging such memorials was tantamount to supporting terrorism,[10] citizens brought flowers to the site to mourn the knifeman.

[42][43] Images published by local media showed white flowers (chrysanthemums according to one source[43]) that had been placed by mourners at the site being dumped into trash cans by plainclothes police officers.

At around 10:00 pm, a large number of police entered nearby Fashion Walk, reportedly as two men were suspected of having attacked a woman who had repeatedly visited the mourning site.

A woman was warned that any effort to pay tribute to the knifeman could potentially be charged as inciting behavior, and that she would be handed a ticket for littering if she put down the flowers she had brought.

Under the Hong Kong national security law, promoting, inciting and supporting terrorism is punishable by up to ten years in prison.

[10] The New People's Party said the incident was planned and premeditated, and that Hong Kong had been full of hatred towards the police and China in recent years.

[55] Kelvin Sin, Information Technology and Broadcasting Policy spokesperson of the Democratic Party criticised the police for determining the perpetrator had been affected by false information or reports within a short period of time and the government for not facing public grievances, worrying that legislation governing fake news would lead to self-censorship of the media, damaging the public's right to know.

[56] Paul Yip Siu-fai, director of the Centre for Suicide Research and Prevention at the University of Hong Kong, said that violence should never be condoned, and that someone resorting to "such an extreme and cruel way to hurt others and himself" had "rung a warning bell to society".

[57] An unnamed psychology professor at a university in Hong Kong warned against blaming the attack on mental health issues alone, rejecting this as a "simplistic explanation", as published by CNN News.

[16] In what appeared to be an oblique reference to Chan, Chief Secretary John Lee said that "People, especially those with a legal background, must understand that what they say has an influence on society", adding that "Those who try to play down terrorism will be 'sinners for 1,000 years'.

[61] On 7 July, the student union of the University of Hong Kong passed a motion to mourn the death of the attacker, and to praise his "sacrifice".

[13] Arthur Li, chairman of the governing council of the university, said that the motion was "something indecent and not acceptable", and that he would welcome a national security investigation into the responsible student union leaders.

[64] On 18 August, police superintendent Steve Li called the motion "very shocking", said that it "encouraged people to attempt suicide" and that it did not align with "our moral standards".

[66] The same day, the university club associations distanced themselves from the original motion, saying that some representatives had been absent at the voting, while others had failed to be "politically neutral" due to "misunderstanding", for which they apologized.

[71] On 5 August seven members of the governing council of the university signed an open letter in which they denounced the council's decision as "improper according to legal principles", admonishing that "principles of due process and natural justice" had not been followed by denying the students a hearing, and that the "excuse" of risk containment to justify the campus ban was "arbitrarily depriving students of their opportunity to learn" and did not "fit the public expectations of a university to teach by giving guidance".

[63] In an email from 24 August, Registrar Jeannie Tsang asked the students about their "role[s] and manner of participation" in the meeting, while saying that the information would not be used in disciplinary proceedings, if these were started.

[84] In addition, two men were arrested for alleged criminal damage through drawing graffiti in a pedestrian tunnel in Tuen Mun which referenced the 1 July stabbing.

[85] In March 2022, a Hong Kong man named Yung Cheong-ming was arrested over charges of intending to incite people to wound officers.

The basis of the arrest had been screenshots, made in February and March 2022 by a detective of the police's cybercrime unit, of Yung's anonymous comments on the forum LIHKG which had related to the 1 July stabbing.

[89] In a radio interview with RTHK on 24 July, Chief Executive Carrie Lam cited the attack as a reason why she would not hold town hall meetings before her policy address scheduled for October.

Since 2019, when she introduced the town halls as a means to quell public dissatisfaction about her administration before the background of the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests,[90] no further editions had taken place.

Returning to the police station, she made a statement in the presence of a lawyer instructed by the Hong Kong Journalists Association, who had been promised to be alerted in the event of a further query (but was not).

[18] On 28 August, Stand News reported that employees of Vitasoy were asked to sign a form agreeing to share information on themselves and their family members.

While Vitasoy said that this was due to "migrating general personal information" to a new system and checked by an external legal counsel for compliance, Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions Chief Executive Mung Siu-tat said in a 30 August interview with RTHK that the request may have violated legal provisions regarding personal data, and that he suspected that the new policy was linked to the stabbing.