Surely some of the onus would be on the people and companies ignoring all expert opinion and seeking to travel to other countries while their own struggles with containing the virus continue...
A pre-departure COVID test should be required for all flights.
With the rate of spread in the US, the risk of having infected -and probably asymptomatic- people on board is not negligible.
Having to stay in closed quarters, breathing the same air, going to the same toilets, wearing the same mask, with a good portion or people not caring much for all the extra measures and who will probably find ways to defy the order to wear masks properly, well, that doesn't seem a particularly way to fly.
A test within 3 days before departure would at least give a chance to temporarily prevent someone from infecting others.
Some countries already require the test before entering their borders but as a airline, I would expect that to be enforced before departure, for all flights.
The next problem is the testing infrastructure. Few labs (if any) do PCR tests with results guaranteed in the next 72h in major US cities.
What if test results are late? Should you delay and take the first flight after getting the results? Now the test was taken 4 days or more before the new flight. Should You take another test?
Airlines or countries that do not want to welcome travelers without a recent, <72h PCR test should set up the necessary infrastructure in the city of the departure airport.
Seems like a perfectly fine way to realign incentives a bit!
If you need a recent test result before entering an airport, you'll have airlines screaming to get some of that test infrastructure in place yesterday.
what you described is the problem and responsibility of the individual. i don't see why it should be at the departure airport, that is an unnecessary scaling issue for countries/airlines.
make it at the arrival airport, if the traveler doesn't have a valid recent test, he can take it again at the arrival airport + mandatory quarantine (and by that i mean in a nearby facility escorted by police). If you want to travel, it should be your responsibility to not infect everyone else...
There are tests that come back in 90 minutes now. If the testing infrastructure is not up to par, and it certainly isn't, then people don't fly. Very simple. This isn't a game. I'd hope that we'd have sorted our testing out by now but that looks like it won't be sorted out this year at all and possibly never. If countries don't want coronas coming to them, they should just ban flights from the US. Otherwise, they should accept that they will be infected. Once again, very simple.
This is exactly what I've been advocating for as well. Does anyone know why this change isn't being made? Seems like a pretty good middle ground between ensuring safety, while continuing to offer flights around the world. Is it due to the challenge with getting scheduled appointments for being tested beforehand?
Edit: Just wanted to add that some airlines have already mandated testing before boarding, such as Emirates and I'm sure others.
This is how it is in my country now. Previously it was recommended to quarantine yourself when travelling from certain countries (US included), but was not mandatory. They changed that two weeks ago after an asymptomatic traveller from the US spend the weekend partying at various bars the whole weekend, then came down with symptoms the following week.
The policy here in New Zealand is that ALL travelers must quarantine in a managed facility for 14 days after arrival.
COVID tests on day 3 and day 12.
Reports have indicated that a fair number of people appear symptom free, but then test positive on day 3.
Of the people that test negative on day 3, some then later test positive on day 12. I'd imagine this percentage would be even higher if they did the first test on day 1
Goes to show that if we just did a single test we'd be allowing enough COVID positive people through the gates to re-ignite the pandemic. You need multiple tests over a time period
Given that the tests take days to come back, this would imply at minimum a need for in-flight refueling and lots of extra galley supplies. Between that and the space taken up by a PCR lab, I doubt there'd be many revenue seats left.
Better to just not put anyone on the aircraft at all, I think. Especially since in-flight refueling of airliners isn't actually a thing that can happen.
The PCR alone takes a couple of hours to run. Labs have significant turn around time because they're taking samples from various testing locations and running them centrally. Plus hardly anyone is running group testing. You swab everyone at boarding and run the test near the airport. For a transatlantic flight, the lab work will beat the plane every time. If you want to add on environmental testing we're looking at a quarantine several hours long at the point of arrival. There's growing evidence that saliva testing is reliable, so the procedure can be far less invasive than nasopharyngeal swabs.
And, yes, I agree. There are very few reasons anyone should be flying right now, mostly limited to "I need to be in place X or I will die."
Big problems in Ireland at the moment with American tourists. I realise it's hearsay and Reddit isn't a great source, but lots of people are complaining that they've seen Americans out and about, who when asked "aren't you quarantining?" have replied that they don't want to quarantine because it would ruin their holiday.
I mean Europe has to decide between the tourist dollars and the virus. Americans have demonstrated themselves unfit for the challenge of dealing with this virus so anyone who really cares about keeping their country healthy will ban Americans until the US basically lets everyone catch it.
Unfortunately, your fellow mask and quarantine non-compliant & self-entitled citizens, putting their own ego above the health of others, disagree with you.
In an infectious disease situation, your following the rules is meaningless when many other US citizens seem to think the rules simply don’t apply to them.
> Americans [...] have replied that they don't want to quarantine because it would ruin their holiday.
The average American vacation lasts for 17 days[1]. A 14 day quarantine would absolutely ruin that. When faced with the complete revision of your plans and the high sunk cost of international travel, human nature is going to take over: "I stayed inside for a day and I feel fine, so..."
If there's one thing Covid-19 has demonstrated, asking people to do the right thing fails in aggregate. If a country doesn't want tourists breaking quarantine, they're going to need to mandate it.
As much as I want my friends and family to come visit me here -- i'm very very wary of Americans being allowed to land in Asia at this time.
It completely drives me crazy that Americans are so divided about masks.
(American here currently in South-East Asia since 2018). As you all know, Thailand, Vietnam, Taiwan and others have some of the lowest rates of Covid in the world.
No one complains about the masks. No one makes a political issue out of it. It's simple -- you can't go into the majority of stores, shopping centers, offices or buildings in any of the cities in these countries.
No Karens. No viral videos about people not wanting to wear (or wanting to wear) masks. And the resurgence of Covid-19 is enough to cause the governments to be super-cautious again.
People wear them. Cute kids wear them. Old and young people. And we are safe. Very few if any infections or deaths over the last 3 months.
Because of the control of the spread, people are more relaxed outdoors and mask use outdoors is around 65% at this point just from looking around.
No Covid-19. Enough. About. The. Masks. Already. Wear one. Protect your fellow humans.
I personally choose not to wear a mask. I don’t have COVID-19, so there’s no reason for me to wear a mask. There’s no evidence that supports the idea of asymptotic spread, so wearing a mask when you have no COVID symptoms accomplishes nothing.
Even if you ignore all the evidence that there is asymptomatic spread, wearing a mask does provide you some protection from others. And indicates that you place some value on others’ safety.
But clearly at this point science and evidence have become matters of personal belief and convenience, which is quite unfortunate.
The current evidence points to asymptomatic transmission being much less likely than symptomatic transmission. This =/= no evidence that supports asymptotic spread.
And that’s ignoring that there are separate studies that think the chance of asymptomatic transmission is much higher, and studies that estimate the majority of transmission is caused by asymptomatic cases. Given the cost of wearing a mask is low and the price of being wrong about the evidence is high, there remains no good reason not to wear a mask.
Asymptotic is a different classification than presymptomatic. Both occurred and “Both are difficult to stop. Presymptomatic spread is believed to be far more common than asymptomatic spread.” https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20200609/who-clairifies-comm...
Critically, you don’t know the future and have no idea if your presymtomatic or not. It’s only relent for contract tracing not masks.
I consider myself fairly hygenic and don't think I have any diseases, and don't really think we should be concerned about clouds of particulate spittle - so what difference is a little quantity?
If I want to spit on the restaurant or train floor, I darn well will! What difference does it make?
I'm walking around minding my own business, not spitting on people. People who wear their masks while riding a bicycle or walking down the street are making decisions based on what a biased media has told them, not science or data.
Which is why I chose two private domains in my examples - a consumer retail environment and public transport, both of which were subject to a change in culture 100-odd years ago, wherein prior boors wouldn't have even questioned spitting on the floor.
'Clearly that is rude' to a modern audience.
I don't disagree with your views on people wearing masks when there's no one about, or they're in a car or on a bike, etc, but you didn't make a distinction initially between that and places where it's reasonable to expect people should 'just shut up and put a mask on'.
It's never a reasonable position that someone should "shut up and do what I say". So many pro-science and rational thinkers have let fear totally consume them. I'm not sure why. The death rate for COVID-19 is less than 1% of infected.
It's more 'stop being a prick and be polite'. Society is a series of rules, stated or otherwise, that the generality gravitate around. It's not rocket science, it's just manners.
One has every right not to wear a mask, just as a business owner has every right to deny someone access to their facilities.
Masks are irritating, but the sheer histrionics that they are causing in some quarters is ludicrous and is clearly more 'anti-science' (if that's really your criticism here) than the masked contingent is.
You can't know this with certainty at any given time unless you've been rigorous in avoiding social contact and other exposure, and at worst the mask accomplishes nothing but does no harm (in the vast majority of cases), so there's no reason to _not_ wear a mask.
> There’s no evidence that supports the idea of asymptotic spread
"Asymptomatic transmission (i.e. when the infector has no symptoms throughout the course of the disease), is difficult to quantify. [...] Pre-symptomatic transmission (i.e. when the infector develops symptoms after transmitting the virus to another person) has been reported. Exposure of secondary cases occurred 1–3 days before the source patient developed symptoms." https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/covid-19/latest-evidence/trans...
"The extent of truly asymptomatic infection in the community remains unknown. [...] Multiple studies have shown that people infect others before they themselves became ill, which is supported by available viral shedding data" https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/transmissi...
I'm in the same boat - Been in SEA for a number of years. All the locals wear masks and there's no issue. The foreigners are the ones pushing against it.
"Healthy people in the community are not currently required to wear a face mask for protection from COVID-19 in New Zealand. In our current environment, the potential benefits of requiring masks to be worn by all healthy people in the community are not felt to outweigh the potential risks."
Yes, because New Zealand has such a low transmission rate they can carefully track and isolate new cases. Because there's such a low rate, they don't need masks.
When it's everywhere, like in the US, we don't have that option. Masks are one of few mitigations available to us.
I think the problem is driven by laziness. People just can't be bothered. But they identify as "hard working" and need to provide some kind of post hoc justification. And the current mess of identity politics provides an oven ready excuse for every situation.
I hope the EU and other big destinations take action against this to prevent spreading the virus even further now that a large part of Europe is about to get hit with a second wave. The USA can hardly control the spread of the virus inside their own borders, let alone convince people to quarantine. I wouldn't feel very comfortable letting in any tourists from the USA, Brazil or any other country with bad anti-corona measures without an enforced mandatory 14-day quarantine after arrival.
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¹ Source: Jonas Nart COVID19 Tableau https://public.tableau.com/profile/jonas.nart#!/vizhome/COVI...
Edit: I had to look this up because it sounded strange Germany would go against the EU travel recommendations and openly allow American travellers. They do not: https://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/en/einreiseundaufenthalt/cor...
Having to stay in closed quarters, breathing the same air, going to the same toilets, wearing the same mask, with a good portion or people not caring much for all the extra measures and who will probably find ways to defy the order to wear masks properly, well, that doesn't seem a particularly way to fly.
A test within 3 days before departure would at least give a chance to temporarily prevent someone from infecting others.
Some countries already require the test before entering their borders but as a airline, I would expect that to be enforced before departure, for all flights.
What if test results are late? Should you delay and take the first flight after getting the results? Now the test was taken 4 days or more before the new flight. Should You take another test?
Airlines or countries that do not want to welcome travelers without a recent, <72h PCR test should set up the necessary infrastructure in the city of the departure airport.
If you need a recent test result before entering an airport, you'll have airlines screaming to get some of that test infrastructure in place yesterday.
make it at the arrival airport, if the traveler doesn't have a valid recent test, he can take it again at the arrival airport + mandatory quarantine (and by that i mean in a nearby facility escorted by police). If you want to travel, it should be your responsibility to not infect everyone else...
Edit: Just wanted to add that some airlines have already mandated testing before boarding, such as Emirates and I'm sure others.
as such, visitors should: 1. take a test when they land 2. quarantine 3. take another test
that's how some countries have approached this "test at the airport" strategy.
basically provide negative results over a set period of quarantine, as i read it.
COVID tests on day 3 and day 12.
Reports have indicated that a fair number of people appear symptom free, but then test positive on day 3.
Of the people that test negative on day 3, some then later test positive on day 12. I'd imagine this percentage would be even higher if they did the first test on day 1
Goes to show that if we just did a single test we'd be allowing enough COVID positive people through the gates to re-ignite the pandemic. You need multiple tests over a time period
PCR the cabin air and the waste stream.
Swab everyone and group test them. Then if there's a positive you hold everyone and retest them individually.
Better to just not put anyone on the aircraft at all, I think. Especially since in-flight refueling of airliners isn't actually a thing that can happen.
And, yes, I agree. There are very few reasons anyone should be flying right now, mostly limited to "I need to be in place X or I will die."
Here's an NYT article saying the same: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/world/europe/Ireland-amer...
In an infectious disease situation, your following the rules is meaningless when many other US citizens seem to think the rules simply don’t apply to them.
The average American vacation lasts for 17 days[1]. A 14 day quarantine would absolutely ruin that. When faced with the complete revision of your plans and the high sunk cost of international travel, human nature is going to take over: "I stayed inside for a day and I feel fine, so..."
If there's one thing Covid-19 has demonstrated, asking people to do the right thing fails in aggregate. If a country doesn't want tourists breaking quarantine, they're going to need to mandate it.
[1]: https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2019/08/28/what-does-a...
(American here currently in South-East Asia since 2018). As you all know, Thailand, Vietnam, Taiwan and others have some of the lowest rates of Covid in the world.
No one complains about the masks. No one makes a political issue out of it. It's simple -- you can't go into the majority of stores, shopping centers, offices or buildings in any of the cities in these countries.
No Karens. No viral videos about people not wanting to wear (or wanting to wear) masks. And the resurgence of Covid-19 is enough to cause the governments to be super-cautious again.
People wear them. Cute kids wear them. Old and young people. And we are safe. Very few if any infections or deaths over the last 3 months.
Because of the control of the spread, people are more relaxed outdoors and mask use outdoors is around 65% at this point just from looking around.
No Covid-19. Enough. About. The. Masks. Already. Wear one. Protect your fellow humans.
But clearly at this point science and evidence have become matters of personal belief and convenience, which is quite unfortunate.
And that’s ignoring that there are separate studies that think the chance of asymptomatic transmission is much higher, and studies that estimate the majority of transmission is caused by asymptomatic cases. Given the cost of wearing a mask is low and the price of being wrong about the evidence is high, there remains no good reason not to wear a mask.
Critically, you don’t know the future and have no idea if your presymtomatic or not. It’s only relent for contract tracing not masks.
If I want to spit on the restaurant or train floor, I darn well will! What difference does it make?
'Clearly that is rude' to a modern audience.
I don't disagree with your views on people wearing masks when there's no one about, or they're in a car or on a bike, etc, but you didn't make a distinction initially between that and places where it's reasonable to expect people should 'just shut up and put a mask on'.
One has every right not to wear a mask, just as a business owner has every right to deny someone access to their facilities.
Masks are irritating, but the sheer histrionics that they are causing in some quarters is ludicrous and is clearly more 'anti-science' (if that's really your criticism here) than the masked contingent is.
You can't know this with certainty at any given time unless you've been rigorous in avoiding social contact and other exposure, and at worst the mask accomplishes nothing but does no harm (in the vast majority of cases), so there's no reason to _not_ wear a mask.
> There’s no evidence that supports the idea of asymptotic spread
"Asymptomatic transmission (i.e. when the infector has no symptoms throughout the course of the disease), is difficult to quantify. [...] Pre-symptomatic transmission (i.e. when the infector develops symptoms after transmitting the virus to another person) has been reported. Exposure of secondary cases occurred 1–3 days before the source patient developed symptoms." https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/covid-19/latest-evidence/trans...
"The extent of truly asymptomatic infection in the community remains unknown. [...] Multiple studies have shown that people infect others before they themselves became ill, which is supported by available viral shedding data" https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/transmissi...
"Healthy people in the community are not currently required to wear a face mask for protection from COVID-19 in New Zealand. In our current environment, the potential benefits of requiring masks to be worn by all healthy people in the community are not felt to outweigh the potential risks."
When it's everywhere, like in the US, we don't have that option. Masks are one of few mitigations available to us.
The US can’t even get past square one.
Don’t believe the hype.
The majority of people Just go along with whatever. Most people are receptive to masks. There’s a tiny vocal minority that are against them.