Promoting healthier safer tourism to the Caribbean

The Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) has launched a Caribbean Travellers Health Assurance stamp and an app, to protect the region’s tourism sector and safeguard the health and safety of residents and visitors.

The Caribbean Travellers Health Assurance stamp for healthier safer tourism (HST) is a measurable and verifiable recognition award for tourism entities and destinations that are implementing the recommended proactive COVID-19 health monitoring and safety measures.

Joy St. John of CARPHA explains; “This is part and parcel of CARPHA’s Travellers Health Programme (THP) that provides an early monitoring and response system to public health issues that impact tourism. The THP, is a key outcome of a partnership established six years ago to bridge collaboration between health and tourism authorities. Caribbean travellers now have the added assurance of a healthier, safer option for accommodation (hotels, guesthouses) and services (transport, tour operators) awarded the HST stamp.”

The Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) and the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association (CHTA), the region’s tourism bodies, have officially approved the stamp.

Facilities awarded the HST stamp will be listed as preferred options on the Caribbean Traveller’s Health Mobile App. They will also later be listed on the websites of CARPHA and CHTA, with links to regional and international health and tourism stakeholders.

The Caribbean Traveller’s Health Mobile App is a health information app for travellers and health and tourism stakeholders. It provides travel health information by each Caribbean destination (inclusive of vaccination requirements, health care facilities, accommodation listings), health alerts of current public health issues, COVID-19 proactive/prevention measures, and travel requirements by country (testing, health screening, pre-approval, and tracking). It links directly to CARPHA’s COVID-19 situation reports, guidelines, and the THP.

In addition to the stamp and the app, CARPHA’s Proactive COVID-19 Health Measures for Tourism are aimed at building travellers’ assurance, tourism resilience, and regional health security. Measures include using the Tourism and Health Information System (THIS), a web-based, early warning and response information system to capture illnesses in real time and thereby reduce spread and reputational damage; certified training in COVID-19 health measures for the hospitality sector (including testing, masks, social distancing, hand washing hygiene, sanitisation, and response from visitor arrival to departure); guidelines and checklists; hospitality health, safety and environmental sanitation operational standards.