BANGKOK, March 29. /TASS/. More than 160 Russian tourists are stuck on the Philippine islands of Boracay and Luzon because of the quarantine imposed in that country amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, the Russian embassy in the Philippines said on Sunday.
Thus, according to the embassy, as many as 129 Russian are staying on the island of Boracay, including four persons permanently residing on that island, and 35 Russian citizens are on the island of Luzon.
Minister-counsellor of the Russian embassy Tatiana Shlychkova said earlier that a 170-seating plane will arrive from Russia’s Vladivostok on March 30 to evacuate Russian tourists.
A total of 457 Russian nationals were evacuated from the Philippines on March 27.
According to the latest update, as many as 1,418 coronavirus cases have been confirmed in the Philippines. Seventy-one patients have died and 42 have recovered. The country’s government imposed a six-month emergency regime and banned air and sea service between Manila and provinces. A curfew has been imposed in the capital city. Many foreigners have found themselves stuck on the islands as they had failed to reach international airports.
A pneumonia outbreak caused by the COVID-19 virus (previously known as 2019-nCoV) was reported in China’s city of Wuhan, a large trade and industrial center with a population of 12 million, in late December 2019. Cases of the new coronavirus have also been reported from 160 countries, including Russia, which by now has 1,534, with eight deaths and 64 recoveries. According to the latest update, the novel coronavirus cases across the globe have neared 620,000, with nearly 30,000 fatalities. The World Health Organization (WHO) has officially described the situation with the novel coronavirus as a pandemic.