By Dominique Gabriel G. Bañaga
The province of Negros Occidental is ready to accept fully vaccinated travelers without requiring them to undergo RT-PCR tests.
This comes as more proposals are now being forwarded to the National Inter-Agency Task Force to start easing domestic travel in the country in order to further open up the country’s economy, according to Provincial Administrator Rayfrando Diaz.
The proposal is still being deliberated and the national government has yet to give the go ahead.
Diaz said the province itself has already registered a substantial number of vaccinees in their monitoring system and vaccine identification cards have already been distributed to them.
He pointed out they were previously concerned that vaccination cards could be faked, although the issue seems to be resolved now, thanks to the use of QR codes for the vaccine cards.
The QR codes can be scanned at the airports, wherein the person’s vaccine information will be revealed.
“We are ready for that,” Diaz said.
He further stated that Philippine Airlines has again contacted the provincial government in order to introduce passenger flights which can only be occupied by fully vaccinated individuals and removing the RT-PCR test requirement prior to or after arrival.
Earlier on Tuesday, Presidential Adviser for Entrepreneurship Joey Concepcion revealed that governors from various provinces around the country are now open to easing travel restrictions for domestic air travel for the fully vaccinated in order to boost tourism activities.
Aside from Philippine Airlines, Cebu Pacific and AirAsia Philippines are also calling on the national government for lesser quarantine days for international travel and removing RT-PCR test requirement for fully-vaccinated individuals.
Concepcion said governors and mayors are now open to the idea of allowing airliners to fly vaccinated passengers without the RT-PCR test, while those who remain unvaccinated will still be required to undergo swabbing prior to being allowed to travel.
The proposal was initially shelved due to the threat posed by the COVID-19 Delta variant and concerns that vaccination cards being issued by local government units can easily be faked./DGB, WDJ
