Beginning February 10, the Philippines will grant entry to fully vaccinated leisure travelers from countries that are permitted visa-free travel, the Department of Tourism announced earlier this week.
Qualified tourists will no longer have to undergo quarantine upon arrival, but are required to present a negative RT-PCR test taken from their country of origin 48 hours before their departure. They will also need to self-monitor for symptoms for seven days after their arrival.
Tourism secretary Bernadette Romulo Puyat thanked the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) for approving the tourism department’s proposal, adding that this was “a welcome development that will contribute significantly to job restoration, primarily in tourism-dependent communities, and in the reopening of businesses that have earlier shut down during the pandemic.”
“With years of coordination between national agencies, industry stakeholders, and the various local government units (LGUs) to prepare our destinations for tourism in the new normal, we are confident that we will be able to keep pace with our ASEAN neighbors who have already made similar strides to reopen to foreign tourists,” Puyat added.
The country will also retire the “red, yellow, green” classifications that previously set different entry restrictions.
Meanwhile, returning residents and overseas Filipinos will also no longer have to quarantine and are subject to the same RT-PCR requirements as tourists beginning February 1.
Check out which countries are eligible in the Department of Foreign Affairs’ advisory.
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