Rapid COVID-19 testing at airports essential for air travel rebound – By Chris McGinnis (SF GATE) / Sept 12 2020
CDC will end its screening of inbound passengers next week
If international air travel is ever going to open up again in the age of coronavirus, it’s becoming apparent that some kind of fast and efficient COVID-19 testing program will be required at airports. With the U.S. government’s decision to stop its current ineffective policy of checking international arrivals next week, it looks like the private sector might have to take up that task – and that’s starting to happen, too.
For several months now, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has mandated that international flights from many countries arrive at 15 U.S. airports staffed and equipped to scan passengers for COVID-19. But the screening process has been skimpy at best: It only requires travelers to fill out a health questionnaire and submit to a temperature check, measures that do nothing to identify many asymptomatic individuals who could be bringing the disease into the country. So the CDC has now decreed an end to that program effective Sept 14.
CDC’s “enhanced entry health screening” is currently required for arrivals from China, Iran, the U.K., the Schengen countries of Europe, Brazil and Ireland. Starting next week, CDC said, it will replace the existing procedures with “more effective mitigation efforts that focus on the individual passenger” – like better education about COVID-19, voluntary collection of contact information from travelers by electronic means, “potential” testing for COVID-19, and “post-arrival passenger recommendations for self-monitoring.”
Continue to article: https://www.sfgate.com/travel/article/Rapid-COVID-19-testing-airports-15557370.php
