No quarantine for tourists

Tourists from Europe have been able to fly to America again for a month – if they are fully vaccinated. Now the government of President Joe Biden wants to tighten the entry regulations again. A quarantine obligation for tourists will not be introduced for the time being.

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They’re back, the tourists from Europe. Whether in a Starbucks in Washington or in the subway in New York, German swear words and Swiss dialect expressions can be heard again in the big American cities. Since the end of the Corona entry ban, which fell on November 8, thousands of fully vaccinated tourists from the Schengen area are said to have flown across the Atlantic, reports the travel industry.

Now this trip to the USA is getting a bit more complicated again. Startled by the omicron mutation of the corona virus, President Joe Biden’s government is planning to tighten the entry protocol, as the White House announced on Thursday night. According to this, from next week all people flying to America will have to be tested for the corona virus in the last 24 hours before leaving for the USA. This means that the test requirement, which currently only applies to foreign nationals, will also affect American passport holders again in the future. (Currently, only foreign citizens who are fully vaccinated and can show a negative corona test are allowed to enter the USA.)

Mandatory quarantine after landing?

For the time being, however, the Biden government is refraining from sending all travelers to America for a corona test after their arrival in the USA. The Washington Post had previously reported on mind games that would have made such a test mandatory for the first five days after landing at an American airport. Another piece of good news for Swiss tourists: the White House is also refraining from introducing a forced quarantine, which according to “Post” could have lasted up to seven days.

In a background discussion with journalists, an adviser to Biden described the new measures as sufficient for the time being. If the health authority CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), which is responsible for formulating the corona requirements, recommends further measures, “we will not hesitate to implement them”.

President Biden will give a speech today, Thursday, in which he will discuss his administration’s corona plans for the coming winter months. In recent months, there has been a division of labor between the White House and the CDC health authority. Biden was responsible for the big picture, while the experts formulated the small print of the Corona requirements.