More destinations allow fully vaccinated tourists

Wednesday, October 27, 2021

On Wednesday, Department of Tourism said that more and more tourist destinations will be permitting fully vaccinated travelers without confirmatory swab tests as majority of their employees get full protection against COVID-19.

Baguio, Iloilo City, Negros Occidental have vaccinated all its tourism members. Travelers with two doses of the COVID-19 jab are not anymore required to produce a negative RT-PCR test, as per Tourism Secretary Bernadette Romulo-Puyat.

Romulo-Puyat said that shortly Boracay will follow the same after it reaches 100 percent vaccination rate on November.
She also mentioned that individuals are considered fully vaccinated two weeks after their second dose.

“Our goal na lang is we want to vaccinate 100 percent (of tourism workers) before the Christmas season,” she told ANC’s Headstart.

“There’s really no problem with the tourism sector. Everybody, all our tourism workers want to be vaccinated.”
No more, Boracay has any active case of COVID-19, as per Romulo-Puyat. She said that its recent covid patient was reported last week who had mild symptoms.

“The only thing we’ve proven about this is vaccines work. It’s not only the vaccination, I have to give credit to the LGU (local government unit) and private sector because it’s not about you’re vaccinated but you still have to implement the minimum health protocols,” she said.

“Wear a mask when you can, (observe) physical distancing with people. Stick within your bubble pa rin, wash your hands.”

Romulo-Puyat also said that Philippines is currently “in talks” with other Asian countries and is aiming on a travel bubble pact with South Korea as it is the country’s “number 1 tourist market,”

“Though walanq (there’s no) quarantine coming here…but the problem is pagbalik nila may quarantine pa rin sila ng 14 days,” she said.

“Hopefully this will ease up. Every week nagbabago naman eh (it changes), countries are slowly opening up. Hopefully by Christmas this won’t be the case, it won’t be a problem going here and coming back to their countries.”

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