Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, also Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE, has directed changes to be made to the travel protocols for passengers arriving or departing from Dubai.

The revisions to the protocols aim to ease hassles for passengers and exempt citizens from additional procedures without compromising on precautionary measures to ensure the safety of passengers, a statement said.

Under these directives, the Supreme Committee of Crisis and Disaster Management in Dubai announced a new set of travel protocols for Emiratis, residents, tourists and transit passengers travelling into and out of Dubai.

According to the revised protocols, Emiratis returning to Dubai from overseas are not required to do a PCR test prior to departure, regardless of the country they are coming from and the time spent there. They will only be required to conduct a PCR test on arrival in Dubai.

All residents and inbound tourists will have to undergo a PCR test prior to departure for Dubai while transit passengers from some countries are required to conduct a PCR test prior to departure for Dubai.

The pre-travel test is also mandatory for transit passengers if their destination country requires them to do so.

Emiratis, residents and tourists travelling overseas from Dubai are only required to undergo a PCR test prior to departure if their destination country requires a pre-travel negative test certificate.

The Supreme Committee of Crisis and Disaster Management said the new travel protocols are part of a regular process of revising and optimising precautionary measures based on the latest local, regional and international developments.

The amended protocols are based on the recommendations of frontline entities combating the pandemic including the Covid-19 Command and Control Centre and the Dubai Health Authority (DHA) and a comprehensive assessment of the global situation, it added.

The announcement came as the UAE reported a new peak in daily coronavirus infections, rising to 1,181 in the last 24 hours.

The Ministry of Health and Prevention (MoHAP) said that it conducted 107,187 Covid-19 tests in the same period.

The new coronavirus cases bring the total number in the UAE to 96,529.

MoHAP also announced a further three deaths due to Covid-19 complications, bringing the total number of deaths in the country to 424 while an additional 1,168 individuals have fully recovered, bringing the total number of recoveries to 86,071.

Dubai Economy on Friday said it has fined a further eight retail establishments and warned 13 others for not adhering to the precautionary measures to limit the spread of Covid-19 while 643 businesses were found to be compliant.