Covid-19 | Gov’t presents detailed plan for future mass testing

The health authorities yesterday presented their detailed plan for a potential second round of mass nucleic acid testing (NAT) of the whole population of Macau.
The plan was unveiled by the director of the Health Bureau (SSM), Alvis Lo, during yesterday’s press briefing on the Covid-19 situation in Macau.
According to Lo, the plan resulted from analysis of the results obtained from the first mass testing held earlier this month and took into account both the opinions collected by different government departments involved, and feedback from the population.
“We have held several meetings and [have] already acknowledged what [work] we did not do well, as well as [having] collected the opinions of the different sectors and the citizens,” Lo said.
Although the plan incorporates improvements in five different areas, the one that Lo highlighted as the primary focus concerns the long waits and agglomerations of people queuing up for the test sampling.
To avoid a repeat of that scenario, the director said that for future mass testing there will be a stricter system of NAT scheduling which must be followed by citizens. There will also be a higher number of NAT sampling collection posts and an increased number of collection booths per post. These are among other measures aimed at facilitating access and flow for citizens to undertake the test, including those that have mobility issues or difficulties booking the test.

More posts, booths and added accessibilities
Among the most significant changes to be made is the addition of 10 new sample collection posts to the previous 42.
The number of collection booths covered by the 52 posts will also grow from the previous 269 to 367, including those from the 10 new posts and additional booths at all of the other 42 posts.
“For people with special needs we will have 10 posts that will have special corridors [to fast track these people] and we will also have seven posts that will be solely dedicated to caring for people with special needs,” Lo said, adding, “For people with the need to cross the border, we will have 14 posts where they can have the test done, at their own cost.”
Previously, there were only four of these paid post.
According to the official, the booking system will also allow people to see the waiting time at each post and how many people are currently waiting.
Lo also clarified that, in case people need to cross the border, they must choose one of the 14 posts that offer the service of uploading the test result to the health code. Otherwise, “for the general public they will not receive the results of the test. It won’t appear in their health code anymore, as happened on the first time,” Lo said. He explained, in response to media questions, that in the case of a positive test, the health authorities will contact that person directly to perform another test, this time at the Conde de São Januário Hospital Center.

Mass testing Task force
Another change that will result from the increase of posts and sample collection booths is the need for more human resources to handle testing.
For that purpose, the health authorities will operate with a “mass testing task force” that includes approximately 6,000 staff members involved in the first mass testing, and an additional 2,650 people recruited among health professionals and other volunteers.
“We have recruited around 650 physicians and other health professionals, as well as 2,000 volunteers, to participate [from the mass testing tasks],” Lo said, adding that such a task force for the NAT will include five sub-groups allotted to different tasks.
Lo has said that physicians and other health care staff from the private sector will be collaborating for these tasks, along with dentists, therapists, and even Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners.
A significant part of the group of volunteers will be people linked to the education sector, remarked the Education and Youth Development Bureau deputy director, Kong Chi Meng.
He explained that these people will mostly be performing tasks connected with registration, personal data checking, and other administrative tasks needed to hasten the process.
The goal of health authorities is for the process to be completed in a maximum of three days, and that each person need not wait more than 30 minutes to complete the full testing.

Backup and Cloud system to prevent failures
Another improvement made is the use of a new backup system for online booking of the NAT, along with a backup for the health code also to be lodged in the cloud.
According to Lo, the idea is to prevent any failures due to high traffic or other network problems, claiming that, in the case of a failure of the main system, the government can guarantee that a swap to the backup system can happen in just 15 minutes.
The police authorities will also help providing accurate data in real-time on the status of the collection posts with more people waiting, and as such the forecast waiting time for each post, in order to help citizens make the best choice in the moment.

Family infected with Delta variant recovering well

During yesterday’s press briefing from the local health authorities on the Covid-19 situation in Macau, the coordinator of the Novel Coronavirus Response and Coordination Center Dr. Leong Iek Hou announced that the local family of four infected with the Delta variant of Covid-19 are recovering well. Having undergone treatment, they have now been moved to the Public Health Clinical Center in Coloane, where they will complete the final stage of their recovery.
The family has been in isolated treatment since August 3, when they were identified as infected. The case prompted the decision to conduct mass testing for the whole population.