Airlines for Europe on Thursday (5 January) joined Iata and Airports Council International in protesting the guidance, which recommends testing arrivals from China when the country’s borders reopen for the first time since early 2020 on Sunday (8 January).

The recommendations from the EU’s Integrated Political Crisis Response group (IPCR) also call for all passengers on flights between China and the EU to wear face coverings, and that EU governments introduce random Covid testing for passengers arriving from China.

A4E said the recommendations were "at odds" with an assessment by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, which earlier this week said China’s Covid epidemic was unlikely to impact the situation in Europe where the same variants of Covid-19 are already circulating and where there is high levels of immunity owing to vaccination and natural immunity from infection.

Together, A4E, Iata and ACI have called for a move away from testing air passengers as a means to track Covid-19 infection, and said the IPCR’s additional recommendation to test wastewater from airports and aircraft arriving from China "offered an alternative" – adding airlines and airports would "do their utmost" to facilitate sampling if it was to become a serious consideration.

A4E, though, said that while the recommendations "amounted largely to a knee-jerk reaction", it was important they were now implemented by EU member states in a "fully uniform manner", stressing along with Iata and ACI, it stood ready to engage with efforts to reassess the measures by mid-January.

"We urge EU member states and China to work together and to reconsider at the earliest opportunity their requirements for systematic pre-departure testing of travellers based on a scientifically driven risk assessment," said A4E.