Wednesday saw a 86.1-percent day-on-day decline in the number of visitors to Macau, said a police official at Thursday’s press briefing from the city’s Novel Coronavirus Coordination and Response Centre.
Ma Chio Hong, of the Public Security Police, the body responsible for controlling Macau’s border crossings, said that Wednesday saw only 1,800 tourist arrivals by all routes. On Tuesday, the city saw 12,900 tourist arrivals, 46.1 percent fewer than the previous day.
The change coincided with news that a family of four in Macau had tested positive for the highly-infectious Delta variant of Covid-19, which led to the local government starting on Wednesday a mass-testing programme for everyone in the city.
Authorities in neighbouring Zhuhai, in the mainland’s Guangdong province, announced late on Tuesday that starting from 6am on Wednesday, people travelling between Zhuhai and Macau would to need to present a certificate issued within 12 hours of departure, showing a ‘negative’ result for Covid-19. The new measure excludes people working in the logistics industry, stated the announcement.
Guangdong has been the largest-single feeder market for tourists to Macau in recent months, which had seen a recovery in daily arrival numbers.
As of Wednesday evening, there were already over 150 places in mainland China considered either mid- or high-risk in terms of Covid-19. That is according to information released by the country’s health authorities.
Mainland authorities generally warn against travel to any place categorised either as mid- or high-risk.
Since the start of this month, several provincial authorities on the mainland – including Guangdong – have advised their citizens to avoid non-essential outbound trips. The advice coincides with a fresh wave of Covid-19 infections on the mainland that involved the more infectious Delta variant of the virus.
