BE PREPARED: INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL WON’T RETURN TO NORMAL UNTIL 2023

You might want to put those holiday plans on a long hold

A well-known travel expert has delivered some disappointing news to Aussies that were hoping that their dream hoilday travel would soon materialize after the lockdown, warning that our return to normal is quite far away. The impact of coronavirus pandemic on international travel may be worse than most expected, with an international airline boss stating that things won’t be back to normal until 2023.

Industry analysis from the International Air Transport Association (IATA) says it will take years for long-haul international travel to recover to levels seen before it was drastically changed by the pandemic.

In an interview with ABC News Breakfast today, IATA Chief Executive Alexandre de Juniac said, “We have published today a new forecast about the potential recovery of the air traffic, and what we see is that things should come back to normal in 2023, which is later than our previous forecast,”.

“That shows, you know, the importance and the severity of this crisis on air transport … We should join progressively the historical trends by the beginning of 2023.”

“What we have planned is to restart the industry, first by reopening domestic markets, then regional continental markets, such as Asia-Pacific, or Europe, or North America.”

“At the end of 2020, the traffic should be between 50 to 55 per cent of the same level that was in place in 2019.”, de Juniac added.

“So, we would lose something like half the traffic for 2020.”

According to IATA’s report, quarantine-on-arrival measures – like the two-week self-quarantine enforced in the country – would continue to have a negative effect on travel confidence.

The survey sampled on air travellers found that 86 per cent were quite concerned about being quarantined while travelling and 69 per cent would rethink travelling plans if it will include being locked down 14 days in quarantine.

The IATA urged governments to find alternative measures to implement, giving advice that they must “not make that prognosis worse by making travel impracticable with quarantine measures”.

A layering of temporary precautionary measures was recommended until there was a vaccine. Instant-results tests, such as temperature screening, preventing travel to symptomatic travellers, health declarations of asymptomatic travellers and vigorous contact tracing was another recommended option.

“(Quarantine) is a major deterrent,” de Juniac stated in the interview with ABC.

“We are not sure that it is necessary to impose this type of measure, provided we have implemented … (a) multi-layer approach: various sanitary checks and health controls that would guarantee that the risk of contamination is absolutely minimal and low, and the risk of transferring the virus from one country to another is also under control and minimal.”

The report also found that the recovery of the air industry would be ushered by domestic travels and “globally agreed and implemented biosecurity standards” were said to be critical if the international travel sector was to recover.

Mr de Juniac said in the interview with ABC that the airline industry incurred a revenue loss of $496 billion this year.

“There is a risk that some airlines would go to bankruptcy,” de Juniac said.

“So, we are relying on the support packages and the rescue plans that have been put together by governments and that have been announced by governments, with, I have to say, very supportive and open attitudes to help us. But without this plan, half of the airlines could be bankrupt in June, and 80 per cent could be bankrupt in July.”

New analysis shows damage to air #travel from #COVID19 extends into medium-term, with long-haul / int'l travel most severely impacted.

See more ➡️ https://t.co/oxQTLp0emA pic.twitter.com/WVniUHPTdF

— IATA (@IATA) May 13, 2020