The Macao Government Tourism Office (MGTO) has issued guidelines requiring all employees working in Sands China’s Cotai hotels to conduct daily nucleic acid tests (NAT).
“Since some people working at The Venetian Hotel were found to be infected with COVID-19, in order to reduce the risk of further spread of the outbreak, the latest preventive measures of the Health Bureau [must be] followed,” the MGTO said.
The announcement issued by MGTO to Sands China adds that “staff working at The Venetian Macao, Four Seasons Hotel Macao, The Londoner Macao, The St. Regis Macao, Conrad Macao, Sheraton Macao and The Parisian Macao are required to undergo daily testing.”
The requirement comes as another Macau hotel, Casa Real – operated by Kingston Financial Group under license from SJM Resorts – has been classified as a Code Red area after three of its staff tested positive to COVID-19.
With Macau’s largest outbreak continuing to grow, authorities announced that a fourth person has now passed away as a result of the virus with a 94-year-old woman passing away after suffering organ failure.
At the government’s daily press conference on Wednesday afternoon, IAG asked for clarification on the R number – a measure that tracks how quickly a disease is spreading by calculating the number of other people each infected individual is infecting at any point in time. The number has been used globally to highlight whether the spread of COVID-19 is accelerating or slowing, however Leong Iek Hou, who heads the Communicable Disease Prevention and Control Division of the Health Bureau, responded, “We should not be concerned with the number of R naught, we should be concerned with when we will be COVID-zero.”
