The Department of Health said that there is no travel ban in the offing to countries like Japan, Italy and Singapore amid the coronavirus outbreak.
Health Secretary Francisco Duque said that these country are only classified on the medium risk and a travel ban won’t be necessary.
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“Matapos mabigyan ng health risk assessment results ng ating TWG (technical working group) ng DOH, ang ating naging pasya ay hindi natin sila isasama sa travel ban,” Duque said.
Duque also cited the criteria for declaring a travel ban amid the COVID-19 threat.
“Presence of local transmission, volume or number of cases, volume of travelers, and the capacity of the government in our country to respond,” he said.
But the risk assessment is a continuous process according to Duque.
“So depende talaga sa situation. At marami tayong mga criteria na ginagamit para maging maliwanag at may objective basis ng ating travel ban recommendation to the IATF,” he added.
Japan has over a thousand cases of covid-19, Italy has more than 2,500 cases of infection and Iran has over 2,000 cases while Singapore has over a hundred cases of infection.
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