Macau's Health Bureau (SSM) announced this morning that its long-running requirement of mandatory hotel quarantine for arrivals from Hong Kong and Taiwan as well as foreign countries will be scrapped from 00:00 tomorrow.
According to an SSM statement, the 5-day mandatory hotel quarantine will be replaced by 5-day home quarantine.
Previously, arrivals from Hong Kong, Taiwan and foreign countries needed to undergo five days hotel quarantine, followed by three days of isolation at home, known as 5+3.
From tomorrow, arrivals from the two Chinese regions and foreign countries will have to undergo 5-day home quarantine, followed by a three-day ban on travelling onward to the Chinese mainland, known as "optimised 5+3". This means that after arriving in Macau the respective traveller can only enter the Chinese mainland nine days after arriving in Macau.
The arrivals' Macau Health Code will convert to red upon entry into Macau.
For three consecutive days from the next day of entry, the arrivals must undergo a rapid antigen test (RAT, aka "self-test") every day for three days and upload the result to the dedicated website of the Macau Health Bureau. Provided that the three tests are negative for three consecutive days, their Health Code will convert to yellow. The person must undergo a nucleic acid test (NAT) at a testing station on that day, otherwise their Health Code will convert back to red. The arrivals must again self-test on the fourth and fifth days in home quarantine. If the results are negative again, their Health Code will convert to green, allowing them to move without restrictions in Macau.
The bureau pointed out that the "optimised" measure will also apply to arrivals who are currently in hotel quarantine, i.e., they can leave the hotel tomorrow and complete their quarantine at home. However, they can also opt to stay at the hotel at their own expense.
The bureau underlined that entry restrictions still apply to individuals from certain destinations, in line with Macau's COVID-19 prevention and control measures.
Those who cannot stay at a private home in Macau can rent a hotel room for five days instead.
The new measure requires arrivals to obtain a negative NAT result valid for 48 hours before embarking on their trip to Macau by plane, vehicle or ferry.
Mainland Chinese arrivals have never been subject to Macau's mandatory quarantine rules.
As of Wednesday, Macau's COVID-19 tally stood at 1,254, including seven fatalities, according to the latest official data.
