The quarantine period for inbound travellers from overseas will be shortened from 14 days to 10 days, the government announced over the weekend.
From June 15, individuals who meet certain conditions and enter the SAR from Hong Kong, Taiwan or foreign places will be subject to a “10+7” anti-epidemic measure (i.e. 10 days of centralized medical observation in isolation and seven days of self-health monitoring).
The passenger must have completed triple Covid-19 vaccination prior to entry and have tested negative on nucleic acid tests on arrival and during the period of centralized medical observation in isolation.
According to a statement, during the period of self-health monitoring, the Macao Health Code will be displayed in green, subject to the receipt of nucleic acid tests on Day 11, 12, 14, 16 and 17 since arrival.
Those who fail to take the test as scheduled will be assigned a Macao Health Code in yellow; if no test is taken after 24 hours of the specified dates, their Macao Health Code will turn red.
Also, arrivals from the Hong Kong SAR, the region of Taiwan, or foreign places are not allowed to travel to mainland China via the Macau SAR until the nucleic acid test conducted on the 14th day of entry returns a negative result.
Andy Wu Keng Kuong, chairman of the Travel Industry Council of Macau, considers this new directive as the “first step” towards fully easing restrictions, although the newly imposed measure is mainly to attract tourists from Hong Kong and Taiwan to Macau.
If the pandemic continues to stabilize, the Council is optimistic about the number of tourist arrivals in the upcoming summer.
He also hopes that authorities will increase the number of quarantine hotels.
The Times is aware that, at least in the case of the Art Regency Hotel, there are vacancies from July 11 to August 11, while Treasure Hotel is fully booked until July 24.
Last week was the first time the CE had announced that local authorities are in discussion with Beijing about the “10+7” measure,” adding that he hoped such measures could be achieved by summer. LV
