Macao’s official Covid-19 death toll has risen to 52, after 19 people died of the novel coronavirus disease in four days, the Novel Coronavirus Response and Coordination Centre has announced.
According to the Centre, Macao recorded five Covid-19 fatalities on Thursday, seven on Friday, two on Saturday, and five on Sunday.
The 19 victims, 14 males and five females, aged between 66 and 98, had all suffered from underlying health problems.
Twelve of the 19 fatalities had not been vaccinated against the novel coronavirus.
Meanwhile, from Thursday to Sunday, according to the four statements, 461 new patients were admitted to the Health Bureau’s (SS) isolation and treatment facilities after having been diagnosed with the novel coronavirus disease.
According to the SS, Macao’s official cumulative number of confirmed Covid-19 cases stands at 2,693, of which 1,878 have recovered.
Early last month, the government switched to an adjusted anti-Covid-19 approach that implicitly allows constant transmissions of the novel coronavirus in the community.
Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture Elsie Ao Ieong U announced that the government estimated that over 50 per cent of the population had already been infected with Covid-19 by last Friday.
Ao Ieong said that the government estimated that Macao had its first peak of Covid-19 infections between 21 and 23 December, based on its statistical models concerning Macao’s current Covid-19 infection wave as well as its various Covid-19 related figures such as the latest daily numbers of people reporting their positive self-test results on the SS’s online platform, people seeking assessments at community clinics, and people using the government’s support hotline for Covid-19 carriers.
Ao Ieong also said that Macao entered a peak of daily new serious cases on Tuesday last week, adding that after the city passes the peak, the daily new number of cases could be expected to start dropping.
The policy secretary said that the government expected Macao to soon enter its “third phase” of the government’s adjusted anti-Covid-19 approach, when the number of people infected per day would gradually decrease and more and more infected people would recover.
When the Macao government announced its adjusted anti-Covid-19 approach early last month, Ao Ieong said that between 50 and 80 per cent of the population were eventually expected to be infected with the novel coronavirus.
Ao Ieong said on Friday that the government did not believe that 80 per cent of the population had yet been infected with Covid-19 at that time, but estimated that over 50 per cent had been “very likely” infected.
Ao Ieong also said that Macao’s “next challenge” for its fight against Covid-19 will occur on Monday next week when schoolchildren will return to their classrooms.
Meanwhile, the policy secretary also said that the Omicron BF.7 subvariant and the Omicron BA.5 subvariant were prevalent in Macao initially after the government eased its Covid-19 curbs early last month, when each accounted for around half of infections. She said that the BA.5 subvariant has become more prevalent than the BF.7 subvariant more recently.
The BF.7 subvariant is the one currently prevalent in Beijing, while the BA.5 subvariant is currently prevalent in Guangzhou.
Ao Ieong also said that the government believed that the number of daily new infections would fluctuate in the near future, but would not be as high as the number when the infection peak occurred around two weeks ago.
Nevertheless, Ao Ieong urged residents to be well prepared for the possible “periodic” occurrence of peaks of Covid-19 infections in the future, The Macau Post Daily reported.
