The United States is lifting pandemic-induced restrictions on travelers from a long list of countries that were earlier subject to those limitations.
Travelers belonging to Mexico, the United Kingdom, Canada, China, South Africa, Brazil, India, Iran, and most of Europe will now be allowed to travel to the US on the condition that they are fully vaccinated.
The pandemic controls were put in place at the start of 2020 and had banned access to the US for non-citizens who had been in the aforementioned countries 14 days prior to travel.
The restrictions destroyed the tourism industry and stopped friends and family from easily visiting the US.
River Robinson’s US partner was unable to enter Canada for his baby boy’s birth 17 months ago owing to pandemic-induced border closures.
Robinson who resides in St Thomas, Ontario said, “I’m planning to take my baby down for the American Thanksgiving. If all goes smoothly at the border I’ll plan on taking him down as much as I can. Is crazy to think he has a whole other side of the family he hasn’t even met yet.”
The countries under discussion comprised for 53 percent of the total overseas visitors to the US in 2019, as per trade group US Travel. Data from travel and analytics firm Cirium shows that airlines are increasing the flights between the UK and the US by 21 percent during November compared to October.
The passenger volume is projected to remain high in the next few weeks and there will be few if any empty seats on most of the international flights on Monday.
Air travelers are required to show their vaccination status as well as a negative COVID-19 test. Those traveling via land from Canada and Mexico will be required to show only proof of vaccination.
As per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the US will admit fully vaccinated travelers with any of the vaccines that have been green-lighted for emergency use by the World Health Organization (WHO), instead of only those approved by US authorities.
Hence, the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is widely used in Canada, as well as the India-developed Covaxin vaccine, will also be accepted.
The lifting of restrictions has come about following a drastic improvement in the COVID-19 outlook in the US during the last few weeks.
