The government has successfully repatriated 370 Filipino crew members from three cruise ships docked in Italy as part of its efforts to extricate stranded OFWs in various parts of the world due to the novel coronavirus disease-2019 pandemic.
According to the Department of Foreign Affairs, the repatriates arrived in Manila Saturday night via a special flight from Rome, Italy.
They are composed of 248 Filipinos from MV Costa Luminosa from Milan and 122 Filipinos from MV Grandiosa and MV Opera docked in the Italian capital.
The seamless mass repatriation was made possible in close coordination with the Department of Health, Department of Labor and Employment, and the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration, Department of Transportation, Department of Interior and Local Government, and their local manning agencies in the Philippines.
All the 370 repatriates underwent medical checkup before boarding the plane and were found to be asymptomatic. (Roy Mabasa)