The Department of Health (DH) announced today (April 18) that the Prevention and Control of Disease (Regulation of Cross-boundary Conveyances and Travellers) Regulation (Cap. 599H) was invoked to prohibit landing of passenger flights of Cathay Pacific from Manila, the Philippines in Hong Kong from April 19 to May 2, 2021; and to prohibit landing of passenger flights of TATA SIA Airlines (Vistara) from Mumbai, India in Hong Kong from April 19 to May 2, 2021.
Two passenger flights (CX906), operated by Cathay Pacific arriving from Manila to Hong Kong on April 14 and 17 respectively, had each carried two passengers confirmed to have COVID-19 by arrival test. Meanwhile, a passenger flight (UK6397), operated by Vistara arriving from Mumbai to Hong Kong today (April 18) had three passengers confirmed to have COVID-19 by arrival test. The DH thus invoked the above regulation to prohibit landing of the concerned passenger flights according to the established mechanism.
The tightened flight-specific suspension mechanism took effect on April 14. The criteria under the tightened mechanism include: (1) three or more (originally five or more) passengers on a passenger flight arriving at Hong Kong confirmed to have COVID-19 by arrival tests; or (2) two or more passengers on any two flights of the same airline from the relevant original port within a seven-day period (originally three or more on two consecutive flights) confirmed to have COVID-19 by arrival tests. Another existing criteria, i.e. one or more passenger(s) confirmed to have COVID-19 by arrival test on the same flight with one or more passenger(s) failing to comply with the requirement(s) specified under the Prevention and Control of Disease (Regulation of Cross-boundary Conveyances and Travellers) Regulation (Cap. 599H), will remain unchanged.
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