Thirty passengers from Incheon, South Korea, arrived on Wednesday in Quang Nam, marking the arrival of the first tourist group to the central province after a two-year halt due to COVID-19.

The group checked in at a resort in Quang Nam Province following their landing at Da Nang International Airport in the namesake city, about 30km apart.

Quang Nam, home to famed Hoi An Ancient Town, is expected to receive around 300 additional passengers on two other flights from Incheon after they land at the airport over the next few days.

The passengers on the three mentioned flights include overseas Vietnamese and foreign tourists from the U.S., Canada, and South Korea who have been fully vaccinated, hold a negative COVID-19 test certificate issued no more than 72 hours prior to departure, and have insurance coverage for COVID-19 treatment with a minimum liability of US$50,000.

Those requirements are stipulated in the package tour program for international arrivals designed by Quang Nam tourism authorities.

The seven-day tour itinerary consists of visits to Hoi An Ancient Town and My Son Sanctuary, as well as stays at Hoiana Resort Complex, TUI BLUE Nam Hoi Resort An Resort, and Vinpearl Resort & Golf Nam Hoi An.

Wednesday’s international tourists to Quang Nam were the first since March 2020, when border closures and travel restrictions were put in place to facilitate Vietnam’s battle with COVID-19.

Only Vietnamese repatriates, foreign experts, diplomats, investors, highly-skilled workers, and students have been allowed into the country, subject to stringent quarantine requirements.

Quang Nam has reported 1,856 local infections since the fourth coronavirus wave hit Vietnam on April 27.

Over 78 percent of the central province’s adult population have received at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine while nearly 18 percent have been fully vaccinated, according to the national COVID-19 vaccination portal.

Vietnam has detected 1,055,246 COVID-19 infections since the pandemic first hit the country early last year, including a total of 1,050,185 community transmissions in its 63 provinces and cities since the fourth virus wave broke out.

More than 36.8 million people of the country’s 98-million population have been fully inoculated against the coronavirus. 

The central government has relaxed pandemic control curbs over the past few weeks as transmissions have slowed down, partly due to larger vaccine coverage.

However, the number of infections has appeared to rebound in many locales in recent days.

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