Traveling to the Philippines during COVID-19? Updated Restrictions on Travel to and from the Philippines

The Philippine government has imposed travel restrictions for exit and entry into the Philippines, especially from countries greatly affected by the pandemic.

With the pandemia of COVID-19 continuing to spread in countries around the world, the Philippine government has established intructions to test and quarantine all overseas Filipinos and foreigners arriving from overseas.

The dictated instructions, put in place to contain the spread of the coronavirus, will see returning Filipinos and foreigners entering the country, both tested and placed under quarantine previously they are permited to go to their final destinations.

The guidelines exemplify the risk of traveling during the pandemic and are similar to those implemented in other countries to prevent importing new cases of COVID-19.

If you’re a traveler permited to enter the Philippines, here’s what you should be aware of

Who is affected by these measures?

Based on the government coronavirus task force’s Resolution №30 and the Department of Health’s Memorandum №2020–0200 or its guidelines on the management of arriving passengers, compulsory testing and quarantine will affect the following citizens:

• Documented and undocumented overseas Filipino workers (OFWs)
• Non-OFWs such as returning students, scholars, exchange visitors, tourists, diplomats and their dependents
• Foreigners

The Department of Foreign Affairs maintained that due to travel restrictions currently taking in place, only a limited number of foreigners are permited to enter the country. They include foreign relatives of Filipinos as well as holders of Philippines visas earlier issued to accredited foreign governments and international organizations.

Arriving at the Philippines. What’s next?

There are a few points that will be taken into account to test and sort travelers after they arrive in the Philippines:

1. Staff from the Bureau of Quarantine (BOQ) will do a temperature control and gather each person’s health declaration card.
2. Quarantine people will then divide travelers for either “stringent” or “mandatory” quarantine.

• Stringent quarantine: A person showing symptoms of the disease or whose country of origin is one where there is a high level of community infection according to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) latest situation report.
• Mandatory quarantine: A person not showing symptoms and whose country of origin has not been identified as an area with a high level of infection of the disease.

See the WHO’s latest classification of transmission for every country stated to have coronavirus cases here. These categorizations are reviewed weekly and can be corrected if there is new data available from countries.