Hong Kong will ban all non-residents from entering the city from midnight on Tuesday evening in a bid to halt the coronavirus, its leader said, as she unveiled plans to stop restaurants and bars serving alcohol.

Despite its proximity to the Chinese mainland, the financial hub has managed to stave off a runaway outbreak of the deadly virus — partly thanks to the public overwhelmingly embracing masks, hand hygiene and social distancing.

Yet in the last fortnight, the number of cases has more than doubled to 356 after locals and foreign residents flooded back once the pandemic spread to Europe and North America.

On Monday chief executive Carrie Lam announced a raft of measures designed to stop the upward trend.

“From midnight of March 25, all non-Hong Kong residents flying in from overseas will not be allowed into the city,” she said, adding the order would be in place for at least two weeks.

The city’s airport — the world’s eighth busiest — would also bar all transit passengers, Lam added.

Non-residents will still be allowed to enter Hong Kong from the Chinese mainland, Macau and Taiwan but not if they have been to any other foreign country in the last 14 days.

Some 8,600 restaurants and bars with a licence will also be banned from selling alcohol but will, for now, be allowed to remain open.

Lam did not specify when the booze ban would be brought in, but said emergency legislation was being drafted.