Fully vaccinated travelers can now enter NegOcc

By Dolly Yasa

BACOLOD City – Fully-vaccinated travelers can now enter the province of Negros Occidental with no need of a negative RT-PCR test result for COVID-19.

Provincial Inter Agency Task Force action officer Rayfrando Diaz said travelers who are fully vaccinated with authenticated Quick Response (QR) IDs are now allowed to enter the province.

This is based on an Executive Order issued this month by Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson, Diaz said.

Diaz pointed out that travelers should first register with the Safe, Swift and Smart Passage (S-PASS) that requires either a negative RT-PCR test or the verifiable vaccination card.

All the vaccination cards should be reflected in the provincial Management Information System or the vaccination portal of the Department of Information and Communication Technology (DICT).

“We want to accept people who are fully vaccinated with authenticated cards,” Diaz said.

The vaccination cards should have a QR coded ID to avail of the privilege.

Diaz also said that the travel protocol has already been approved by the National Inter-Agency Task Force.

Earlier, the Department of Health-Western Visayas downgraded the risk classification of Negros Occidental Alert Level 3, while the highly-urbanized Bacolod City remains at Alert Level 4.

Areas under alert level 3 are those with high case count of COVID-19, with increasing health care utilization, regardless of Delta variant presence, while alert level 4 are those with huge case count and high health care utilization rates.

As of October 10, the Health Care Utilization Rate (HCUR) of Negros Occidental went down to 53.85 percent from 74.87 percent last week, compared to 75.90 percent in Bacolod City, Dr. Marie Jocelyn Te of the DOH-WV-Center for Health Development, revealed during a virtual press briefing Monday.

However, the risk classification of both the province and Bacolod City downgraded to moderate due to two-week reduction in COVID-19 growth cases and slight reduction in Average Daily Attack Rate (ADAR) per 100,000 population.

The ADAR of Negros Occidental was recorded at 8.12 percent, while it was 22.50 percent in Bacolod City, per 100,000 population.

As of October 11, 2021, the DOH logged 205 new COVID-19 cases in Negros Occidental.