Meliá Hotels International began to vaccinate its employees in Punta Cana, in a process coordinated with the Public Health Department.
Starting with those who provide services at the Paradisus Palma Real hotel, 370 employees of the group in the Dominican Republic were vaccinated this Sunday, although they expect to receive up to 800 vaccinations a day, with the inoculation of the first dose to be completed next Wednesday. The second and final dose of the vaccine - supplied by Sinnovac - is scheduled for 25 May, after which all of the Group's 2,200 employees at the destination will have been immunised.
The operation was conducted in a large common area of the hotel, following all the standards of the Stay Safe With Meliá programme. During the process, regional entities such as Cestur (tourist police), the Provincial Health Directorate, the State Epidemiology Service and the Ministry of Tourism were present and offered their support.
The vaccination of all our employees in a key destination like Punta Cana fills us with satisfaction both as a company, as it represents a crucial step forward for the safety and health of our customers and employees, and for the destination, as it will contribute to anticipate the recovery of international travel to Punta Cana, intensifying the upward curve of tourism demand, which we are already seeing in the searches and bookings of our customers.
Gabriel Escarrer, Executive Vice President and CEO of Meliá
After this successful experience, also successfully implemented in Indonesia, we would like to reiterate the request we have already made in other countries with a high tourism weight, such as Spain, to prioritise workers in the tourism sector in vaccination strategies, allowing them to compete, also for safety, with the most advanced countries.
