Editor’s thoughts by Dolores Vicioso
The good news is that the Dominican Republic has opened to tourism smack in the final week of the presidential and congressional election. It is happening while the ruling party is trying to hang on to its 16 consecutive years in government. The polls say at best they will keep control of the Senate.
The DR is also reopening to tourism at a time when almost all of its source markets have been hard hit by Covid-19. Decisions need to be taken, but politics seems to be the priority right now. The government has restricted social, economic and recreational activities to 8pm, as per the only press release on the new rules on the Ministry of Public Health website. But the spokesman for the Public Health Minister says restaurants can stay open until 10pm. It could be that politicians need the extra time to feverishly try to convince the last voters they are the ones.
The behind-the-scene discussions are intense. Will the country continue to allow unrestricted entry of people from countries that are under heavy spread of Covid-19 ? Will tourists eventually be required to come with PCR tests showing they do not have the disease? The stance of the government in these pre-election days is that the Ministry of Public Health can implement new rules as needed.
For the time being, international arrivals are just screened for fever at the airport and asked to fill out a Traveler’s Health Affidavit.
The former president of the National Hotel & Tourism Association, Joel de los Santos, says that a debate is ongoing over who would pay so that all tourists visiting the Dominican Republic be required to test. In an interview on La Cuestion radio talk show, he confirmed there are ongoing talks about the cost of pre-testing. The discussions could end up with the government picking up half the cost of the tests, he remarked.
These and many more matters are being debated. If a person does not come with a PCR test and is tested here and the outcome is positive, who pays for the quarantine and where? The Dominican government picked up the tab for many of the first tourists who tested positive.
This might still be so in the first days of the opening. Public Health Minister Rafael Sánchez Cárdenas said during the 1 July press briefing: “If a traveler arrives and tests positive at the airport, he enters the Dominican public health protocol that calls for persons to self-isolate if conditions are mild. If the person tests positive and does not show symptoms, the person will be sent to home confinement,” said the Minister. But what happens if the person is a tourist with a hotel booking?
“A traveler who arrives positive, immediately passes through the health system and the established protocols will be applied,” said Dr. Sánchez Cárdenas during the online press conference. He says this means home confinement if the case is mild or the patient is asymptomatic. When hospitalization is needed, the patients will hospitalized.
In January and February 2020, the DR was just recovering from the backlash of unfair accusations regarding health issues of visiting US tourists. Even when flights have been authorized and airports have opened with relatively few restrictions on who can enter, being extra cautious in health matters is in the back of everyone’s mind.
One could say the opening is to start treading the waters. Foreign property owners will be returning to their homes and Dominicans living abroad will come to vote and visit family and friends. Many will be coming from places where the disease is more widespread than in the Dominican Republic. Dominicans who were caught abroad will be returning.
Joel de los Santos says the country expects there only to be a trickle of tourists for the first month. He noted the protocols were approved on 30 June and only now are being circulated. De los Santos explained the protocols had earlier on been shared with tour operators, but they demanded the official stamp from the government. “For the tour operators to promote the product they needed a clear idea of that would apply to tourists at tourism destinations and the hotels,” he explained.
De los Santos says that the first reservations are for vacation rentals. He explained these ensure the physical distance rule can be met. “People have a greater direct control greater over their own environment,” he explained.
Ministry of Public Health press briefing Bulletin #104
La Cuestion
https://domiplay.net/podcast/la-cuestion-radio/super-7/13-00-2020-06-30-Tue
2 July 2020