The International Air Transport Association (IATA), which includes a large part of the world’s airlines, rejection measures anticovid for passengers coming from China implemented by some countries in airports after the reopening of the Asian country to international tourism.
In a statement, IATA Director General Willie Walsh called these measures “ineffective” and stated that tools already exist to manage the pandemic on planes.
Travel restrictions and testing have proven ineffective throughout the pandemic.
Furthermore there is not even a temporary potential gain from these measures in containing #COVID19 as the variants circulating in #China are also widely circulating elsewhere in the?. pic.twitter.com/RDUCqcWhJ2
— IATA (@IATA) January 3, 2023
For this reason, the obligation to present tests for Chinese passengers and other measures that are being imposed are “extremely disappointing, they will damage the economy and destroy jobs,” according to the IATA official.
The airlines recalled the situation experienced a year ago with the arrival of the omicron variant, which spread globally despite the restrictions that were then imposed on air travel originating in different countries in southern Africa, where it had been identified for the first time. time the variant.
In the last week, measures such as the requirement of a negative result in a rapid COVID-19 test have come into force in countries such as Japan, South Korea, India, Malaysia, the United States, Spain, Italy, France or the United Kingdom to travelers from China.
Several of them are also inclined to recommend personal hygiene measures for travelers, including a recommendation to wear a mask on flights from China.
Along with this, they ask for the control of wastewater from planes, monitor the entry of new variants into airports and improve the sequencing of the virus, among other measures.
As of January 8, COVID-19 in China will no longer be a category A disease, the level of maximum danger and for which severe measures are required to contain it.
This effectively marks the end of the “zero covid” policy, dismantled by the authorities after protests broke out.
