Tourists and citizens from neighboring countries will be able to get vaccinated in Argentina

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The Minister of Health, Carla Vizzotti, advised today that the government would start vaccinating tourists entering the country. “We have enough stock of vaccine doses for all Argentines at all stages of life”, said the official, and added that the measure is aimed “mainly at children under 18 years of age, who will be able to enter the country without being vaccinated for tourism”. But it will also be offered to those who visit the country “for some exception”.

In addition, she assured that the State would implement a plan to offer vaccines at the borders to citizens from neighboring countries. “Argentina has vaccines available to vaccinate incoming tourists and for the vaccination strategies of neighboring provinces, vaccination at the borders,” she said.

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The Minister of Tourism, Matías Lammens, also participated in the announcement. “It will be a huge attraction for tourists from all over the world to visit us. We know what tourism means, we have seen it in the last few days, the last long weekend broke all forecasts, the pre-shipping with millions of Argentines using it and walking around Argentina, and we expect a record season.”

“Inbound tourism is a determining factor for the national economy; in 2019, it was the fourth item in foreign currency generation”, said the official.

In this line, Lammens detailed changes in the regulations to enter the country. Since October 19, the antigen is not required at entry, tourists are exempted from PCR at 5/7 days and are only asked for a complete vaccination schedule and negative PCR 72 hours before admission.

Also, quarantine will be exempted for children under 18 years of age who come with their families, and they will be given the possibility to get vaccinated.

Another announcement was the application of a third dose to those over 50 years of age who were vaccinated with Sinopharm and to immunocompromised persons of any age.

As the Minister of Health explained, the decision was taken based on the recommendations of the W.H.O. and international organizations: “The evidence shows that progress can be made in immunocompromised people, people with low defenses for any reason, people over three years of age who have received any vaccination schedule. We are going to work on planning and distribution with each of the provinces.” These two groups contain approximately 1.6 million people.

Regarding tourism policy, Vizzotti clarified that Argentina would authorize the entry of tourists already vaccinated, so the risk (of coronavirus infection) is significantly reduced. The United Kingdom is an example of a country with a significant increase in cases, but thanks to vaccination, it has not resulted in hospitalizations and deaths.”

“This is possible thanks to the large number of vaccines that Argentina got. These are strategies that other countries have implemented, we have a huge expectation with inbound tourism. More tourists mean more work, reactivation and consolidate employment recovery numbers in the gastronomic activity,” completed Lammens.

The head of the health portfolio also discussed the possibility of Argentines to travel after having received the Russian Sputnik V vaccine: “It is not that they are not allowed to enter, many countries are authorizing entry for tourist reasons to people who have vaccines prequalified by the WHO. It is not that they are not allowed to enter for work, health, or study reasons. You do the paperwork, and you can enter. To say that you cannot leave Argentina with Sputnik is incorrect.”

She explained that the government is working to speed up the authorization procedures: “The Russian Federation has notified us of the progress regarding the presentation of the missing information because what the WHO does is not to authorize the vaccine as the regulatory entities do but to evaluate the plants and the manufacturing process. The other point is to work with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to show the vision that the whole world should have in relation to accepting the vaccines approved by each country. This is what Argentina is doing in the framework of solidarity and economic reactivation around tourism. In Argentina, there are between 10 and 11 million people who have started the Sputnik scheme. We are working to resolve the situation as soon as possible.”