Have pass, will (hopefully) travel

During the holidays, a good number of Filipino families planned escapes from the confines of their pandemic shelters for out-of-town vacation destinations. As law-abiding as possible under the new norms, required travel permits were sought to be able to reach their destinations.

Many found the procedures, as laid out by the Joint Task Force (JTF) COVID Shield tedious, even risky. The most challenging basic travel documents required included a medical clearance certificate (MCC) from the local government health center, a travel authority (TA) from the local police station, and a travel pass-through permit (TPP) if passing cities or towns that are under a restricted policy on the way to your destination.

Two months ago, the JTF announced that it was working on an online platform that would allow people to get a TA and TPP without going to the local police stations. Such a move was well meaning, but definitely ambitious if the objective was to get the platform working in time for the holidays.

Thus, those desperate enough to travel painstakingly undertook the required procedures to acquire permits – and even with all that, had to put in a lot of prayers that all would go well if and when they would have to pass police checkpoints along the way.

Luckily, I was told, border patrols were not many, and not as strict as it was nine months ago when the whole of Luzon went into its first lockdown. Last December, it also helped that infection levels were dropping in many areas; many of the provinces, in fact, had none.

Easing up

Longer distance domestic travel is now being allowed, although still under the radar of pandemic restrictions. In permitting more local travel, the government is largely relying on the transportation companies to ensure that their passengers are without the contagious coronavirus, thus mitigating the spread to the destination communities.

Some provincial buses are now allowed to carry passengers on longer travel, but only if commuters secure a medical certificate and a TC, and get negative results from a reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) or rapid antigen test within 72 hours before boarding.

Domestic air travel, likewise, is easing up, with beleaguered airline companies putting in the extra effort to help facilitate the completion of travel requirements of prospective passengers. For flag carrier Philippine Airlines, for example, one may get the results of a RT-PCR test within 24 hours at its own testing facility.

All these processes, however, are far from smooth sailing. Non-essential travel to Baguio City for the New Year holidays had been allowed, for example, but was recently closed again after new infections showed signs of a community spread in the city and neighboring Benguet towns.

The possibilities that give rise to outbreaks are many and often difficult to control, and this gives rise to the difficulties in our government efforts to ease travel restrictions, with the ultimate goal of allowing larger parts of the economy to escalate activities.

Cooped up too long

The Department of Tourism is one government agency that has been trying its best to find ways of reviving both its domestic and international travel programs under the new normal environment, especially this year in anticipation of eventual widespread vaccinations.

The DOT has been asking for some uniformity in local travel protocols as a way of supporting growth in the domestic tourism sector, an area that the agency feels can regain footing faster to help in the overall economic recovery efforts.

Filipinos have been cooped up in quarantine for too long, and the urge to travel even not during a long holiday season has been building up. Having clear and easy steps to achieve a safe leisurely vacation away from home would help boost domestic tourism.

Organized small travel packages are potentially easier to manage under “bubble” protocols that make it easy to do rapid contact tracing procedures should any infection happen.

Getting away is key

While the cost of this kind of travel is higher, the total amount would still be cheaper than going on an overseas vacation. Getting away is the overriding key, and it doesn’t matter if it’s just going to be to a local sand and sea destination or going on a nearby mountain trek adventure.

For this matter, stakeholders of the DOT’s MICE (meeting, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions) sector are supporting the resumption of more activities, citing their professional capability and culpability to institute health safety protocols during events, thus voiding these events to become super-spreaders.

The tourism industry has been opening up coordination lines with concerned local government agencies to enable the issuance of travel permits and the smooth travel of tour groups, but it is still far from perfect.

The government had already allowed earlier last year the gradual reopening of Boracay Island to local tourists who qualify all travel requirements. Eventually, more destinations were given the green light, including Baguio, Batangas, Bohol, Ilocos, Siargao, and Palawan.

Such proposed “new normal” travel tours and events, should these establish an acceptable safety track record, would immensely help the tourism and travel industry, which had been among the worst hit by the government-imposed quarantines.

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