Plans change for 30,000 tourists, European travel firm cancels flights to Phuket

Following the cancellation of Thailand’s “Test & Go” tourist scheme amidst fear of an Omicron outbreak, the Europe’s largest travel firm TUI Nordic announced it had cancelled scheduled chartered flights to Phuket from December to April next year. Around 30,000 people had plans to travel to the island province.

The head of the Phuket Hotels Association (Kata and Karon), Angkhana Thaneswisetkul, said most visitors were hesitant to visit Thailand after Omicron cases piled up despite the New Year’s holidays, and that some EU nations are already instituting quarantine for returnees from countries with the new variant.

“The announcement came on December 25, a couple of days after the government suspended the Test & Go scheme, which allows registrants to enter Thailand without having to quarantine.”

At the same time, the acting president of the Chon Buri Federation of…