Macau’s Novel Coronavirus Response and Coordination Centre confirmed the city’s 73rd and 74th cases of COVID-19 late Monday, taking the number of new infections for the day to three and effectively ending any chances of the border with Zhuhai reopening during the Golden Week holiday period.
The new cases follow confirmation just hours earlier of Macau’s 72nd case – a 46-year-old man who lives in Zhuhai but had been in Macau for work since Sunday 26 September. His positive test result saw the government announce a third round of mass testing for all people in Macau, to be conducted over 48 hours from 9pm Monday.
The two additional cases are a 56-year-old Chinese non-residents worker and a 40-year-old non-resident worker who both worked with case No 72 recently. It was reported overnight that case No 73 had received both doses of a COVID-19 vaccine but was asymptomatic with no signs of discomfort.
A late decision by authorities to cancel the planned midday reopening of the border with Zhuhai has left Macau’s IR operators facing an incredibly grim Golden Week, with figures from the Public Security Police Force showing just 4,906 visitor arrivals over the first three days of Golden Week combined. They include 1,749 last Friday, 1,373 on Saturday and 1,784 Sunday.
By comparison, 980,000 people arrived in Macau during the October Golden Week in 2019 at an average of 140,000 per day.
