Vietnam delays reopening of resort island due to low vaccination rate

HANOI, Sept.24 (Reuters) – Vietnam has pushed back a plan to reopen the resort island of Phu Quoc to foreign tourists until November, after failing to meet vaccination targets for residents due to a supply insufficient in vaccines, state media reported.

The Southeast Asian nation, which is currently closed to all visitors except returning citizens and investors, struggles to speed up vaccinations to help contain a spike in COVID-19 cases caused by the Delta variant in recent months.

Authorities initially planned to allow vaccinated foreign tourists to start returning to Phu Quoc in October to revive the tourism sector and support the economy. Read more

“We have to vaccinate the residents here for herd immunity, but the vaccine stocks are insufficient,” the official VTC newspaper said quoting Huynh Quang Hung, chairman of the Phu Quoc Town People’s Committee.

Officials on the island last week said an additional 250,000 to 300,000 doses were needed to achieve herd immunity.

So far, only 2.9% of residents of Kien Giang, the province that is home to Phu Quoc, had received two doses, according to official data.

Overall, 7.3% of Vietnam’s 98 million people are fully vaccinated – one of the lowest rates in the region.

Phu Quoc detected a new COVID-19 cluster on Monday after months without local cases, although provincial authorities said it was under control and would not affect the reopening plan.

Authorities said Phu Quoc would have a phased reopening over six months from November 20, with up to three charter flights landing per week.

As part of the plan, the island expects to welcome 3,000 to 5,000 visitors during the trial period, with mandatory COVID-19 testing carried out by authorities, VTC said in Thursday’s report. .

It is still not clear whether visitors will have to undergo a seven-day quarantine period, as the Vietnamese Ministry of Health has requested.

Foreign arrivals to Vietnam fell from 18 million in 2019, when tourism revenues were $ 31 billion, or nearly 12% of gross domestic product, to 3.8 million last year.

Plans to welcome tourists come as Malaysia reopened its island of Langkawi to domestic visitors last week, while Thailand opened up the islands of Phuket and Samui to foreign tourists with vaccines.

Editing by Ed Davies

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