By Kate Alison Boyore
Instead of the usual 14 days, fully inoculated Filipinos are required to undergo only seven days of facility-based isolation and are no longer obligated for testing as the country’s pandemic response task force announced, June 4.
The Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases’ (IATF) announcement was backed by the Department of Health (DOH) saying those who complete their doses no longer need to commit to a full quarantine period.
Inbound travelers must bring with them their vaccination cards for verification before departure and after arrival in the country.
IATF said to be considered fully vaccinated, two weeks must pass after being administered a single-dose vaccine or the second dose of brands requiring two doses.
The policy will not cover returning Filipinos and foreigners who have been vaccinated abroad according to Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque. They must still follow the 10-day facility-based isolation and a mandatory swab test on the 7th day.
Regarding this, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire admitted there are still challenges with the country’s vaccine verification system.
"Kailangan lang po nating ayusin 'yung sistema because we need to have a form of verification kapag ang isang tao ay nabakunahan sa ibang bansa," she said during the Laging Handa briefing, Saturday.
(We just need to fix the system because we need to have a form of verification whether a person has been vaccinated abroad or not.)
She said bilateral agreements and coordination with other countries would help solve this problem.
Vergeire added that restrictions for fully vaccinated Filipinos are still in place because the country is currently in the process of boosting its vaccination pace, unlike other countries which have exceeded 30 to 40 percent of citizen vaccination.
A total of 1,206,371 out of 5.18 million vaccinated Filipinos have completed their doses as of June 1.
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