Airports Council International (ACI) Europe has expressed regret at the actions of a number of states within the EU and globally for imposing health-related travel restrictions including systematic pre-departure or on-arrival testing of travellers from China.
The airport trade body argues that testing travellers from China and/ or imposing restrictions for those travelling from China is neither scientifically justified nor risk based. What’s more, the ineffectiveness of international travel restrictions in preventing the spread of COVID-19 and its multiple variants of concern (VOCs) has been unequivocally recognised by both the European Centre for Prevetion and Control (ECDC) and the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Commenting on the unilaterally imposed health-related travel requirements, Olivier Jankovec, Director General at ACI Europe, said: “We are once again plunging back into a patchwork of unjustified and uncoordinated travel restrictions, which have no basis in scientific fact.
“Clearly we still have to learn the painful lessons of the past years. These travel restrictions do not work and current arrangements for EU coordination have failed once again.”
Underlining that states need to remain vigilant to the status and control of the virus, ACI Europe states that the focus should be on increasing genomic sequencing to be able to identify possible new COVID-19 variants and related surveillance. Such an approach does not require travellers to be tested but could be achieved by means such as the testing of wastewater from airports.
