The boss of London Heathrow Airport has called for the removal of testing for all vaccinated travellers after rules introduced to combat the Omicron variant saw 600,000 flight bookings cancelled in December alone | latikambourke
The boss of Heathrow Airport has called for the removal of testing for all vaccinated travellers after rules introduced to combat the Omicron variant saw 600,000 flight bookings cancelled in December alone.
Global travel restrictions introduced by governments in an effort to contain the COVID-19 pandemic have seriously hindered the aviation sector.Heathrow – the UK’s busiest – recorded just 19.4 million passenger movements in 2021, even fewer than the number recorded in the first year of the pandemic. Heathrow CEO John Holland-Kaye said there was no prospect of the aviation sector recovering for as long as travel restrictions remained in place.“There are currently travel restrictions, such as testing, on all Heathrow routes – the aviation industry will only fully recover when these are all lifted and there is no risk that they will be reimposed at short notice, a situation which is likely to be years away,” he said in a statement.
Restrictions introduced around the world in response to the highly contagious Omicron variant saw tens of thousands of flights cancelled over Christmas as soaring cases numbers restricted passenger travel and resulted in flight crews isolating. The UK’s Transport Secretary Grant Shapps has said he can see a future where only vaccination status – rather than testing status – is required for international travel.
While Omicron’s transmissibility has seen cases skyrocket, Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison said this week that the variant’s severity was about 75 per cent less.
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