Cebu City is planning to shorten quarantine period for fully vaccinated ROFs

The Cebu provincial government will soon issue a new memorandum that will shorten the quarantine period for fully vaccinated returning overseas Filipinos (ROFs) for not more than five days, Governor Gwendolyn Garcia said late Tuesday.

“Vaccination is a personal choice, and it should be incentivized, can we not add this as further incentives for vaccination,” Garcia told reporters in a press briefing.

Under the latest protocol, ROFs as well as overseas Filipino workers will be tested upon arrival and will be placed in a quarantine facility or a hotel.

On the fifth day, they will undergo another swab test and if they tested negative for COVID-19, they will be released from the quarantine facility. This is once again a deviation from standard testing on the seventh day of quarantine as mandated by the national COVID-19 Inter-Agency Task Force.

However, Garcia said there is no date yet on the implementation of the new protocol.

On Sept. 7, Garcia discussed the new protocols with top regional officials of the Department of Tourism, Department of Health, Bureau of Quarantine (BOQ); Hotel, Resort, and Restaurant Association of Cebu; and the Overseas Workers Welfare and Administration.

If approved, ROFs may present their vaccination card, government certification of vaccination or the BOQ-issued International Certificate of Vaccination upon arrival at the airport.

OFWs, on the other hand, may present their Philippine Overseas Labor Offices-verified vaccination card or government certification of vaccination.