The Macau authorities concluded this Wednesday, at 11:00 a.m. (03:00 Lisbon time), a round of nucleic acid tests on the entire population, without finding new cases of Covid-19.
The New Type of Coronavirus Contingency Center has confirmed that more than 725,000 people have been tested since Monday, with at least 708,500 already confirmed negative, according to a statement.
China’s special administrative region has launched a round of nucleic acid tests for the entire population, after detecting more than a dozen new cases of Covid-19 last week.
On Tuesday, the director of the Macau Health Services (SSM), Alvis Lo Iek Long, stressed that the authorities do not know the origin of the latest infection, a man who works in the territory and lives in the neighboring city of Zhuhai.
At a press conference, Alvis Lo stressed that “there is a certain risk” of transmission in the community and admitted that “there is a great possibility” that at least one more round of tests will be carried out on the entire population.
For its part, the Macao Economic and Technological Development Services (DSEDT) have called on the points of sale and collection of products purchased through the Internet to “reinforce disinfection cleaning” and “prevent the transmission” of the virus. Covid-19 “through the products”.
In August, Alvis Lo had said that the worst Covid-19 outbreak in Macau since the start of the pandemic, between June and July, was caused by “objects or products from abroad”.
The World Health Organization (WHO) stressed that “there is no evidence so far that viruses that cause respiratory illness are transmitted through food or food packaging.”
“Coronaviruses cannot multiply in food, they need an animal or human host to multiply.”
In July, Macau initially suspended the import of mangoes from Taiwan for a week after detecting traces of the new coronavirus on the outside of a package.
The Macau Industrial Association told Lusa in August that it was impossible that the importation of food infected with the new coronavirus caused the Covid-19 outbreak in the city, pointing to a “very strict” control system.
Virologist Celso Cunha, from the Institute of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (IMHT), in Lisbon, told Lusa that the probability of Covid-19 outbreaks in Macau originating from contaminated food is “extremely low”.
The Chinese special administrative region of Macao, which follows the zero-case policy imposed by Beijing, has registered six deaths and more than 2,500 cases, including asymptomatic, of Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic.
Source: TSF
