Photographer: Mladen Antonov / AFP / Getty Images
Photographer: Mladen Antonov / AFP / Getty Images
Thailand is easing travel restrictions on visitors 56 countries, including the United States, Japan and Singapore, are approaching the high holiday season to boost the country’s troubled tourism sector.
Tourists can enter Thailand without prior visas, but will need to bring a health certificate to prove they are free of Covid-19 and undergo a mandatory 14-day quarantine upon arrival, according to Taweesilp Witsanuyotin, a spokesman for the Center. Covid. 19 Situation management. Visitors will also undergo three virus tests while in quarantine, an increase over the previous two obligations, Taweesilp said.
Thailand relaxes brakes on foreign tourists after special long-stay visa program unveiled in September lukewarm response and the authorities were forced to do so suspend a successful travel subsidy program for local tourists to investigate allegations of corruption. More frequent tests for visitors during quarantine may help the government shorten the isolation period to 10 days from next month, Said Taweesilp.
Quarantine will help authorities prevent the virus from spreading locally and is considered a more effective strategy than limiting access to tourists from so-called low-risk countries amid a new rise in cases around the world, Taweesilp said. .
“The definition of which countries have a low risk or a high risk changes every day. We let them all in, but we quarantine them on arrival, ”Taweesilp said in a briefing on Thursday.
New cases
Friday, Thailand reported three new local cases among relatives of a 67-year-old Thai fish trader he had gave positive a day earlier. The new cases brought the nation’s total to 4,300, according to official data. Thai authorities have warned against rallies violating Covid-19 rules during Christmas and New Year to avoid savings on local broadcasts after they have largely managed to contain the outbreak.
Travelers from the 56 designated countries, which also include Australia, Italy and France, will be able to stay Until 30 days for tourism activities as part of Thailand’s unilateral agreements since before the pandemic. Citizens of five countries (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Peru and South Korea) can stay in Thailand for 90 days, according to the Covid-19 group. But the country will not issue any visa on arrival or allow free travel for 14 days for those in Cambodia and Myanmar until the virus outbreak improves, he said.
“These are new processes and models of travel that we need to adjust to in the new normal,” Taweesilp said.
Thailand is betting on a revival of its tourism industry to emerge from a recession, and the central bank predicts it may take at least two years for Southeast Asia’s second largest economy to return to pre-pandemic growth levels. Arrivals of foreign tourists generated more than $ 60 billion in revenue from some 40 million visitors in 2019.
(Updates with details on new local cases in the sixth paragraph.)