The World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) has laid out a
new set of guidelines called Safe and Seamless Travel, which includes testing
and tracing to allow people to travel safely during the pandemic.
The initiative is part of the WTTC’s Safe and Seamless
Traveller Journey (SSTJ), which aims to cover the end-to-end journey including
flights and other modes of transport. It includes systematic biometric-verified
identification for long-haul and international travel to replace manual
verifications, as well as faster clearance for inbound and outbound passengers
and the detection and isolation of people with the virus.
According to the WTTC, testing and tracing is crucial in the
case of coronavirus since it is believed 80 per cent of carriers are asymptomatic.
The council is calling on global governments to collaborate
on internationally-recognised guidelines to enable approved travellers to visit
multiple destinations using a single process and risk assessment framework. It
is also supporting the establishment of travel corridors between low-risk areas
or countries, which it said could limit testing requirements for travellers.
Gloria Guevara, WTTC president and CEO, said: “The safety
and hygiene of travellers is paramount, which is why our new guidelines for
Safe and Seamless Travel, including testing and tracing, are designed to assist
in the recovery of travel and tourism through the identification and/or
isolation of infected travellers. This is consistent with advice from WHO and
other leading health authorities that the best way to control and reduce the
spread of the Covid-19 virus is through early identification of carriers to
ensure they don’t travel.
“The new WTTC guidelines mean that we can now replace the
confusing mix of different measures including highly damaging quarantines,
which currently exist, to offer confidence to travellers and governments alike
while protecting public health.”