International Air Transport Association talks about future of air travel

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) is proposing biosafety measures for air travel.

“The first thing I want to say is that we are opposed to excessive measures by some governments that impose mandatory quarantine for all travelers who come to them,” said Alexandre de Juniac, head of IATA.

Earlier, the association spoke out against the policy of social distancing in aircraft. The international air travel sector will not recover under these conditions.

The IATA survey found that 84 percent of travellers said quarantine measures for arrivals were a major concern, and 69 percent said they would not travel while foreigners were restricted.

“Our main goal is to restart air travel around the world with a high degree of safety,” said the head of IATA.

On May 19, IATA announced a list of risk-based measures.

Before departure:

States to which people are flying must collect data on foreign passengers, including health information.

At the departure airport:

Restriction of access to the departure terminal of strangers. Exceptions are for persons accompanying disabled persons and minors.

Temperature control at the entrance, carried out by government services of the countries of departure.

Social distance at all stages of airport procedures.

The use of masks at the airport is at the discretion of the authorities of individual countries.
Extension to the maximum number of pre-flight procedures of the principles of self-service: primarily for check-in for the flight, baggage check-in, control of boarding passes during boarding.

Restructuring the boarding system: new gate designs to avoid crowds of people, limiting hand luggage in the cabin.
Disinfection measures for airport areas – according to the national regulations of each country, but with hand sanitizers.

In flight:
Any face covering for passengers and masks for aircraft personnel.

Simplified service in the cabin, pre-packaged meals - to avoid unnecessary interaction between the crew and passengers.

Measures to avoid congestion of passengers in the aisles in flight (for example, exclude queues to the toilet).

Increased disinfection of the cabin between flights.

At the airport of arrival:

Temperature control at the airport entrance.

Automated border and customs control using special mobile applications and biometric technologies.

Accelerated baggage handling and delivery to minimize crowding.

Filling out “health declarations” and tracking the contacts of tourists to minimize the risk of “import” infection.

“The combination of these measures, in our opinion, will allow us to manage the risk of spreading the infection,” said de Juniac.

IATA stresses that the proposed measures are temporary and should be reviewed, some of them can be replaced or canceled.

IATA hopes to implement two main measures that can generally change the “rules of the game” in the COVID-19 era and ensure the safe movement of air passengers:

Testing of air passengers on COVID-19, if it is large-scale and will give quick results. The test will provide a “sterile” air passenger environment to assure states of the safety of air travel and tourism.

The association will support the development of an immune passport system that will single out groups of travelers at zero risk.

Source: atorus