The Novel Coronavirus Response and Coordination Centre (hereinafter referred to as the “Centre”) indicates that, with an aim to further improve the function of the Macao Health Code, a new version of the app will be launched at 00:00 on 13 April, which will include a new function of inputting the date of the last day of travel or residence.

Before the update, people with travel history were only required to check “yes” and choose the places where they have stayed in the past 14 or 21 days in the column of travel and residence history, with no need to mention the date of travel. Though being simple to use, this setting may cause the following issues:

1. It was necessary to remember to revise the travel or residence history; after returning to Macao and completing the declaration in travel or residence history, the concerned individuals would forget to revise the content and lead to wrong declarations that affected the correct colour displaying on the Macao Health Code;
2. It would result in failure to master the actual travel or residence history of the concerned individuals, and accurate risk assessment and targeted anti-epidemic requirements would not be possible.

Thus, with this update, when returning from abroad or when the risk level of a certain region changes, users would need fill-in more detailed and accurate information of travel or residence history as well as the departure date of last place of travel. If no changes are made to the places visited 14 or 21 days after the departure date of last place of travel, the system will automatically remind the user in order to avoid their daily lives due to incorrect declarations.

In addition, this new measure will also make it possible to alert individuals who have been to certain areas, that they should undergo nucleic acid tests or observe other anti-epidemic measures. According to the declared departure date of place of travel, the system will automatically determine which nucleic acid testing requirements and anti-epidemic measures the Macao Health Code holders will be subject to and will issue corresponding reminders. If the nucleic acid test is not taken as required, the system will issue an alert that the Macao Health Code will be locked ‘yellow’ or ‘red’.

The Centre urges the public to download or update the Macao Health Code mobile app as soon as possible. The up-to-date version is 1.0.7.