A former Macau legislator, Agnes Lam, says inbound tourism to the SAR is returning to pre-pandemic levels after the SAR dropped all travel restrictions on Sunday.

Lam, who is an associate professor at the University of Macau, told an RTHK programme that people are happy they no longer have to use a health code or report Covid cases.

"On Sunday, 70,000 tourists came to Macau," she said. "A week before, as some restrictions were eased, there were 20,000 per day, so this is already the maximum number of visitors in the past three years. People here are happier and feel more confident about the state of the economy now that the restrictions have been lifted."

Lam said most ferry services would take a couple more weeks to reach full capacity as operators had to re-hire and train staff.

She added: "From January 8, we don't really have any restrictions now. There's no restrictions about reporting any Covid results. If you are sick, and test positive, you can rest at home. If a person feels OK, they can work, as long as they are not working in public services."