International Arrival
The Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment, Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, has said that starting from 6th July 2021, all foreigners entering Indonesia must have a vaccine card.
“All foreigners who enter Indonesia, starting 6th July 2021, must show a vaccine card to show they are fully vaccinated and a negative PCR result for COVID-19 before they can enter Indonesia,” explained Luhut.
Exceptions to vaccine cards, Luhut said, were granted to diplomats and visiting foreign officials at the ministerial level in accordance with diplomatic relations practices that are also applied by other countries.
Meanwhile, for Indonesian citizens who will enter Indonesia but do not have a vaccine card, they must first show a negative PCR for COVID-19 to get on a flight. After being quarantined and testing negative, they will be immediately given the vaccine.
Spokesman for the Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment Jodi Mahardi added that “both foreigners and Indonesian citizens are required to undergo quarantine for eight days with two PCR tests, namely upon arrival and on the seventh day.”
Regarding the eight-day quarantine limit, Jodi said it was in accordance with the direction of the Health Ministry.
The need to tighten the quarantine period for international travellers is a way to increase awareness when dealing with variants of concern. The eight-day quarantine will include carried a combination of entry and exit RT-PCR swab testing, which will be carried out upon arrival and repeated on the seventh day.
Entry testing is carried out to detect COVID-19 as early as possible to attempt to prevent transmission by travellers. Exit testing is carried out on the seventh day to wait for the incubation period of the virus, in anticipation of the virus not being detected in the first test.
The median incubation of the SARS-CoV-2 variants Delta and Alpha is four days. Thus, the eight-day quarantine period covers twice the median incubation period of the virus.
The Indonesian government also claims that the combination of quarantine and entry-exit testing can prevent post-quarantine transmission, with a transmission probability of less than 0.25 percent. In addition, implementation of quarantine for travellers needs to be carried out in a strict and disciplined manner, in order to avoid transmission during the quarantine period.
