Macau latest: New Covid-19 cases bring tally to 37

The Novel Coronavirus Response and Coordination Centre announced Saturday night the Macau’s 36th and 37th novel coronavirus cases, both classified as imported.

The 36th case is a 21-year-old male Macau resident who departed from Portugal on March 13, taking the Emirates, flight EK194 (seat 40A) from Lisbon to Dubai. He then transferred onto the Emirates, flight EK380 (seat 46D) from Dubai to Hong Kong.

He arrived in Macau on the morning of March 15 and was in home quarantine and medical observation. On March 17, he had a fever, headache and other symptoms, and was sent by ambulance to the hospital, where his nasopharyngeal swabs tested negative on March 18 and 20. After that, he continued home quarantine and medical observation.

Saliva was collected for nucleic acid test on Friday, with results coming back positive. On Saturday, his nasopharyngeal swab test also came back positive.

The 37th case is a male Macau resident with Portuguese nationality, aged 32, and is the fiancé of the 11th case, a South Korean flight attendant. Both had visited relatives in Portugal. They flew from Porto, Portugal to Hong Kong via Dubai on March 12. They arrived in Macau in the early morning of March 14 via the HZM Bridge. Since he was listed as a close contact, medical observations were performed at the Conde de S. Januario Hospital Centre from March 16 onward. Two tests came back negative on March 16 and 18. A new test Saturday showed that the results of the nasopharyngeal swab sample were positive.

The health authorities revealed that the two patients have been admitted to the isolation ward of the public hospital, and are in stable condition.

Earlier, the authorities had revealed that the 35th the patient is a 19-year-old male Macau resident who departed from London, UK, on Virgin Atlantic Flight VS206 on March 26 (seat 21G) and arrived in Hong Kong on March 27. He returned to Macau by the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge.

Revealing fever and other symptoms, he was sent directly to the special emergency room of the public hospital for nasopharyngeal swab testing, which turned out positive from the nucleic acid test.

The patient is in normal conditions and has been admitted to the isolation ward of Conde S. Januário hospital.

The 37 confirmed COVID-19 cases includes 10 patients – seven tourists from Wuhan and three locals – who have been discharged from hospital. The other 27 cases, all of them imported, have been confirmed over the last two weeks.