United Airlines is to run a four-week-long pilot programme offering passengers on its New York Newark-London Heathrow route rapid pre-departure
tests for Covid.
The airline said that from 16 November to 11 December, all passengers and crew members on United
flight 14, which departs Newark for London Heathrow at 8.15pm on Mondays,
Wednesday and Fridays, would be offered a free test as part of a project to
help convince officials that international travel is safe.
United will be using a molecular
Abbott ID Now test which can yield a result in 13 minutes. In a study of 955
individuals in which 23 people tested positive for Covid using lab-based PCR
tests, the Abbott test picked up 21 of the positive patients. This means the
test has 91.3 per cent sensitivity (correctly identifying those
with the virus) and 100 per cent specificity (correctly
identifying those that are healthy).
The test will be administered by Premise
Health at a facility in the Newark United Club near gate C93 at Liberty
International. Passengers will need to book the test in advance and are advised
to do this at least three hours before the flight. Those testing positive at
the airport will not be permitted to board but will be offered a refund or the
opportunity to travel at a later date.
“Through the pilot programme, we will ensure that everyone on
board has tested negative for Covid-19 on the day of travel,” said Aaron
McMillan, United’s managing
director of operations policy and support.
The test will not allow passengers to bypass quarantine on arrival
unlike the airline’s recent pre-departure testing programme on its San
Francisco to Hawaii route.
“Customers who participate will still have to comply with quarantine
regulations in the UK,” said McMillan.
Josh Earnest, chief communications officer
at United Airlines, said that in the two weeks since the Hawaii trial
had started, the number of people travelling on the route had nearly doubled as
a result.
On the Hawaii route, United passes on the cost of the test to passengers.
“We certainly feel comfortable that for the four weeks of the trial
we will offer the test for free. We will evaluate whether this a cost we can absorb.
We are optimistic that as we build more of a track record with partners, as we
get into an operational routing and testing capacity begins to expand, all
three of those will put downward pressure on the cost.”
The airline said it had been an “active participant” in discussions
to open
up flights between the US and the UK. “We have been in touch with officials
here in the United States and officials overseas to talk about the potential to
open up those corridors,” said Earnest.
Recently, the airline took part in a limited test on the
transatlantic route of a digital
health passport called CommonPass that could standardise the way test
results are handled internationally.
Earnest said, “We ran a pilot last week that was small in scale
but wildly successful. We continue discussions with CommonPass to look at ways to
further streamline this process. At present, we have people showing up with
paper documentation for various travel destinations and it can be confusing for
customers and employees. Using CommonPass could be of great benefit but we
don’t have any definitive plans to plug them into this pilot and we are evaluating
opportunities.”
The airline is bullish that customer testing will reopen long-haul
travel.
Earnest said, “We are not second-guessing the decisions that
government officials are making. They have a responsibility to look after the
health and wellbeing of their population. We are trying to demonstrate that this
kind of international travel is safe.”
He added: “We are hopeful that this programme
will prompt governments to look at the data and the science to see that this is
a safe way to reopen the economy.”