The Novel Coronavirus Response and Coordination Centre announced yesterday that a 59-year-old local man has been taken to the Health Bureau’s (SSM) Public Health Clinical Centre in Coloane for quarantine, after Zhuhai’s health authorities told their Macau counterparts that when the man was visiting Gulong Gorge in Guangdong’s northern city of Qingyuan on Sunday last week, he was within a distance of less than three metres from a person who was later confirmed as an asymptomatic COVID-19 patient in Guangzhou’s Liwan district – which has been hit by new local COVID-19 cases since earlier this month.
According to a statement by the centre yesterday, the Health Bureau located the 59-year-old man and took him to the public Conde de São Januário Hospital Centre on Saturday night, shortly after Zhuhai’s health authorities notified it of the case, where he tested negative for COVID-19 in a nucleic acid test (NAT).
Despite his negative NAT result and the fact that he has not come down with any COVID-19 symptoms, the statement said, the Health Bureau still decided to transfer the 59-year-old man to its Coloane Public Health Clinical Centre for quarantine and medical observation until the 14th day after he had been in contact with the asymptomatic COVID-19 patient in the tourist destination of Qingyuan, after considering that he risks having been infected with COVID-19.
According to the statement, the man works for the City of Dreams (COD) casino-hotel complex in Cotai as a chauffeur.
The man joined a tour group organised by a travel agency in Zhuhai on May 22 for a two-day trip to Qingyuan, the statement said, adding that the man told the bureau that he had always worn a facemask when visiting Gulong Gorge on the second day of this trip.
According to the statement, the man returned to Zhuhai on Sunday night last week on the travel agency’s coach. His family members met him in Macau and drove him home.
The man received his first COVID-19 jab in Macau on Tuesday last week, after which he underwent a nucleic acid test in Zhuhai which came up negative.
The man visited his relatives in Zhuhai’s Doumen district on Wednesday last week, before returning to Macau the next day when he went to the Jai Alai Oceanus casino in Zape to gamble, the statement said.
The statement said that the man went to work on Friday and Saturday, before he was found by the bureau on Saturday night.
