In view of recent infection of COVID-19 to airport staff in neighboring regions, caused closure of most shops and cancelling of flights there, Airport Operations Department (AOD) of Macau International Airport Company Limited (CAM) convened a meeting with the representatives from airport ground handling services, relevant airlines, security and cleaning company on 23rd June for the sake of strengthening anti-epidemic measures for frontline airport staff and passengers in MIA.

The meeting was chaired by the Director of Operations Branch Ms. Christine Chung who remarked that it was necessary to strengthen the measures against COVID-19 in order to ensure that all the passengers and staff in MIA are well protected. The measures proposed to be strengthened specifically include the following:

• All cargo and baggage unloaded from flights coming from highrisk countries/regions shall go through disinfection process;
• All frontline staff of ground handling services and cleaning unit who may have close contact with the unloaded cargo, baggage or passengers arriving from highrisk countries/regions shall wear designated personal protective equipment of high level of protection, while others including those of security company who station nearby and maintain a certain distance from the cargo, baggage or passengers may wear 5-piece personal protective equipment (i.e. gloves, masks, eye protection, face shield, isolation gown);
• The ground handling services shall allocate dedicated passenger stair trucks and other ground support equipment (GSE) to handle the aircraft coming from highrisk countries/regions, which shall be separated from those used for handling flights from other areas;
• Considering the rapid transmission of the Variants, participating entities are suggested to encourage and provide incentives if possible to their staff to get vaccinated so as to build herd immunity as recommended by MSAR government.

Representative of the cleaning company remarked that they have been disinfecting all arriving aircrafts thoroughly at MIA from high risk countries/regions and properly disposed the protective clothing after disinfection. Representative of the ground handling services reported that the vaccination rate was higher after the Company had granted its staff a day off for vaccination. The Director of Operations Branch appreciated the efforts made by the involved entities for the anti-epidemic tasks of MIA, and required the entities to have the strengthened measures to be implemented as soon as possible.