Thailand welcomes vaccinated visitors with quarantine-free entry

BANGKOK -- Thailand welcomed fully-vaccinated tourists from all countries and regions with quarantine-free travel starting Tuesday, its latest step to revive the tourism sector and economic recovery.

Inbound visitors from all countries and regions could apply for the quarantine-free entry as long as they have been fully-vaccinated and take RT-PCR tests on the first and fifth days of their arrival in Thailand.

The wider reopening, with previous quarantine-free program restricted to more than 60 countries and regions that were designated as low-risk, is expected to bring in up to 300,000 travelers into Thailand in February, with the number likely to further increase in March, according to government spokesperson Thanakorn Wangboonkongchana.

The number of the country's international tourist arrivals shrank to 427,869 in 2021, with more than three quarters of the total entering in November and December, according to the Ministry of Tourism and Sports.

The Thai government has unveiled a series of measures to support the pandemic-ravaged tourism sector, which accounted for about 20 percent of the economy before the pandemic. These included handing out subsidies to boost domestic travel and accelerating vaccine roll-out.

On Tuesday, the Southeast Asian country reported 7,422 new confirmed cases and 12 more deaths over the last 24 hours, raising the total number of infections to more than 2.44 million while that of fatalities to 22,185.

As of Monday, 69.9 percent of the country's nearly 70-million population had been fully-vaccinated while 20.5 percent had received booster shots, according to the Center for COVID-19 Situation Administration.