WTTC urges govts to transition to testing on departure

While welcoming the UK government’s new "test and release" scheme, which will allow travellers returning to England from a non-travel corridor destination to exit quarantine after five days subject to a negative Covid test, the council said the system was still not optimal for all travellers.

Acknowledging likely testing costs of £65pp to £120pp, the WTTC said this would be prohibitive, particularly for business travel.

"To significantly aid the travel and tourism sector, which has been battered by widespread and uncoordinated travel restrictions, quarantines need to be reduced even further or completely replaced with a comprehensive and internationally recognised test upon departure," said the WTTC.

The council also warned that testing on departure would be the only blanket way to get all travellers moving again until wide vaccine availability.

It said it acknowledged and supported any "viable alternatives" to quarantine, such as the oneworld alliance’s free pre-flight Covid tests on select US-UK services.