The EconomistFebruary 13th 2021 Special reportThe future of travel 91V
enetians canbe credited with one significant intervention in
the history of travel and one near miss. Disgruntlement over
the constant din led them to consider a ban on wheelie-bags in
Venice’s alleyways in 2014, though it was never enacted. Seven cen-
turies earlier the city pioneered the use of international borders to
stop an infectious disease. The word quarantine is derived from a
requirement for ships to anchor offshore for 40 days if plague was
suspected. Perhaps inconvenient for ancient mariners, the impact
on the travel business of attempts to keep covid-19 at bay has been
greater. Efforts to restore confidence have accelerated moves to
make travel more digital, contactless and seamless.
Reinstating international travel depends on reassuring people
that it is safe and finding ways acceptable to health authorities to
let passengers fly. Long quarantines are almost as much of a deter-
rent to travel as a ban, says Andrew Charlton of Aviation Advocacy,
a consultancy. “The public are not scared of flying, they are scared
of arriving.” Getting people back onto planes is not a problem, if
the rebound in domestic markets where covid-19 persists is a
guide. A poll in July 2020 by ubsfound that only 10% of European
leisure travellers and 9% of businessfolk would refuse to fly in the
foreseeable future. In October data collected by iatafound that
only 44 out of 1.2bn passengers since the start of 2020 were known
or thought to have contracted covid-19 on a plane. iata’s medical
adviser notes that, even if 90% of cases went unreported, that im-
plies just one infection for 2.7m passengers.
Commercial jets are fitted with a grade of air filter found in op-
erating theatres. The air on board is replaced 20-30 times an hour.
Seating arrangements help. Boeing reckons that sitting side by
side in an aircraft facing a seat back is equivalent to sitting seven
feet apart indoors on the ground. New measures make flying safer
still. Some airlines are keeping middle seats in economy free. Hy-
giene practices go far beyond the cabin crew sauntering down the
aisle collecting rubbish. Queuing for the toilet is banned on some
flights and airlines have introduced rules to keep passengers apart
by ensuring they get on and off in strict row order. Planes are thor-
oughly disinfected between flights.
The main obstacles to a rapid rebound are closed borders and
ever-changing regulations for entry, as covid-19 ebbs and flows.
Out of 220 countries monitored by Kayak, a travel firm, 50 remain
closed to air travel, and most of the rest have some restrictions. Ef-
fective vaccines give hope, but Gloria Guevara, boss of the wttc,
says the travel industry “cannot wait”. Her organisation says that
198m jobs are at risk if current restrictions remain in place until
the summer.
The aviation industry has pushed testing to get planes back in
the air. But agreement on how, where and when to test is covered
by such a mish-mash of different requirements as to make flying
even more troublesome. The Centres for Disease Control and Pre-
vention recommends that Americans should have a test one-to-
three days before flying and three-to-five days after a trip abroad,
and also isolate at home for seven days. It also requires travellers
to America to have evidence of a negative test. Many other coun-
tries require a test as a condition of entry. This is often accompa-
nied by checks on arrival and a period in quarantine, sometimes in
a hotel at the traveller’s expense. A pcrtest, often required bycountries that insist on a test before travelling, can cost $50-150.
Until fast, accurate and cheap tests are available or vaccinations
are widespread, the hope is that a standard pre-departure regime
could allow a restart of international travel. Airlines think trials of
different systems may provide evidence that pre-flight testing is
enough to dispense with quarantine rules. iataand aciWorld, a
global airports association, have called for an internationally re-
cognised pre-flight testing regime to replace quarantine.
If such systems are to work, mutually agreed standards and
some way of showing that passengers are covid-free and/or vacci-
nated will be needed. Qantas’s boss, Alan Joyce, reckons a valid
vaccination “passport” may become a general pre-boarding re-
quirement. This has led to a flurry of activity to develop digital-
health passes. iatais promoting Travel Pass, a digital-health app,
that allows governments to verify tests and identities of passen-
gers presenting a result issued by a recognised laboratory. Free to
travellers, airlines will pay a small fee. A more recent vaccination
credential initiative, backed by tech giants including Microsoft
and Oracle, has a similar aim.
Such technology will become common, reckons Arnaud Vais-
sié of International sos, the world’s biggest travel-security firm.
aokpass, its digital-health pass, is secure and easily readable using
blockchain technology. Apps like this will be the basis for a new fo-
cus on health in travel. Mr Vaissié notes that, after 9/11, security
went from being an obscure corporate function to the main priori-
ty in many boardrooms. Health information will become as vital to
international travel as a passport is today.
The experience of electronic tickets for airlines, which went
from 20% of the total in 2004 to 100% by 2008, shows that digital
data-sharing can cut costs and make travel easier. Technical hur-
dles remain to making different health systems interoperable with
each other and with airlines’ passenger-information systems. Jef-
frey Goh, boss of Star Alliance, the world’s biggest airline alliance,
says the industry is resigned to living with multiple passes. Perso-
nal data will need to be secure but systems must also be flexible
enough to reveal what health data is re-
quired where—lots on arrival in snooping
Singapore but little apart from covid-free
status in America, say. And a way needs to
be found not to discriminate against pas-
sengers who are unable to take a vaccine.
It helps that the travel industry has long
been working on how to make journeys
more seamless. Steve Peterson of ibm, an-
other company working on a digital-health
pass, says such systems could be the “back-Welltravelled
New health and other apps may make travel easierTesting and vaccines
Slow opening-up
Worlddestinations*bytravelrestrictiontype,2020,%Source: UNWTO *Share of world international arrivals in 2019November 1stSeptember 1stJuly 19thJune 15thMay 18thApril 27th0 20 40 60 80 100Complete closure Partial closure Other measures Restrictions liftedA valid
vaccination
“passport” may
become a general
pre-boarding
requirement