MANILA: The Philippines' Tourism Department said the domestic tourism boom in Baguio City, one of the nation's top destinations, is the result of the adoption of antigen testing to determine if visitors are free of Covid-19.
Philstar.com reported that the city was chosen by the Health Department for the pilot initiative to use the rapid antigen test because of its model performance in contact tracing and containment of the virus.
Baguio authorities also run parallel Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction tests (RT-PCR) for comparison.
Currently, the Inter-Agency Task Force on Infectious Diseases has allowed antigen testing and other Covid-19 testing methods to be used on domestic tourists, including authorised and essential travellers.
The antigen test results take 15 minutes, while RT-PCR results take around two to three days to process.
The Tourism Department is hoping that the Baguio experiment will assist in determining if antigen tests can be used as an official test, or whether testing can be done in the earliest stages of infection.
Baguio City mayor Benjamin Magalong, in a meeting with city managers on Sept 24, said the Tourism Department has allocated 1.8 million peso (RM154,617) for the pilot testing of antigens.
The reopening of tourism in the City of Pines "is a calibrated and deliberate move after consultations with the stakeholders, the community and the health sector," said Magalong.
"We will never compromise the health and safety of our constituents and visitors.
"That is why we are working on the principle of safe, sure and responsible travel," he stressed.
Tourism Secretary Bernadette Romulo-Puyat welcomed the adoption of antigen testing so that Filipinos are encouraged to travel domestically using a more affordable Covid-19 test with instant results.
Antigen testing is expected to contribute to an increase in the number of leisure trips and commuter traffic within the region, Puyat said.
The plan is to reopen Baguio City and the provinces of La Union, Pangasinan, Ilocos Sur and Ilocos Norte this month.
