In April 2019, more than two million travelers crossed American airports every day, but a year later, traffic in these airports seemed almost nonexistent, due to the Corona epidemic that occurred without warning.
People are sticking to staying at home for fear of contracting the virus, travel has decreased to more than 95 percent, and the number of travelers has reached fewer than 100,000 passengers across the United States daily.
The fear of travel is still present, and it seems that it will continue for a while, but is what happened considered the beginning of a permanent decline in travel by air, or will things return to normal? And when?
CNBC spoke with healthcare and tourism industry professionals to understand medical risks.
Experts agreed that it would take anywhere from 18 months to two years, before travel travel returned to normal.
Experts believe that the travel industry will be subject to huge changes in the meantime, in addition to the security check, travelers will undergo a medical examination to ensure that they are free of the virus, and tourists will start spending their holidays in places close to their country or from their homes, and not much will travel to far away .
A poll conducted by a travel-market research company called Longwoods International showed that 82 percent of Americans had already changed their travel plans for the next six months due to the new Corona virus, and half of them said they had canceled their trips, according to a survey of 1,000 adult Americans.
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Risky
Both aviation and public health experts believe that travel in particular, will be slower to recover.
Airlines, such as Delta, are considering issuing unofficial “immunity passports” to those who prove they have contracted and recovered from the virus, indicating that they have become immune to the disease.
However, a Harvard professor of global health, Ashish Jha, doubts the success of such an idea, as it has been shown to repeat the virus infection again to people who have already recovered “and the tests are still not accurate.”
The airports are now measuring the temperature, but Jhaha believes that, despite its importance, it does not detect patients who do not show symptoms.
Jha believes that the solution for airlines to persuade travelers to return and feel safe is to provide tests and places to isolate the injured, and to reassure passengers on planes that the injured are not on board the flight after checking everyone.
Airlines began requiring passengers to wear face masks, and some began to implement social distance within the plane by vacating the middle seats.
And many airlines are still canceling the international flights that were to be taken during the coming summer and autumn.
Experts say that the return of travel traffic little by little, mainly due to a significant decrease in the number of infections and deaths caused by the virus.
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