PNP stops issuing Travel Authority

The Philippine National Police (PNP) will no longer issue a Travel Authority after the national government has eased the travel restrictions in any part of the country by cancelling the usual travel requirements that also include a medical certificate.

Instead, policemen manning the border control points will only look for the negative result of the RT-PCR (Reverse Transcription-Polymerase Chain Reaction) before they would allow anybody to enter a town, city or provinces.

The RT-PCR requirement, however, still depends on the decision of the local government units.(LGUs). In the case of Cebu province for instance, all the travel requirements were already lifted in a bid to revive its economy as a result of the lockdown measures since March last year.

Lt. Gen. Cesar Hawthorne Binag, deputy chief for Operations of the PNP and the concurrent commander of the Joint Task Force (JTF) COVID Shield, said he will be issuing a memorandum to all the police units around the country with regard to the resolution of the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of the Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) to lift the requirement for Travel Authority and the medical clearance certificate.

The Travel Authority is issued by PNP units with the authority from the JTF COVID Shield while the medical clearance certificate is issued by the Municipal or City Health Office. But before a Travel Authority is issued, a medical clearance certificate is required.

Binag said there will be some adjustments for travel based on the new resolution issued by the IATF-MEID.

“But we advised our commanders to regularly coordinate with their respective LGUs for the proper implementation of the travel restrictions and quarantine protocols,” Binag told the Manila Bulletin in an interview.

Part of the coordination, according to Binag, is the proper checking of the signs and symptoms and other quarantine rules-related measures with the help of the health officials of the LGUs and other government agencies.