gaynorch1

13 hours ago, Poet said:

Every survey in the West shows that there is massive pent up demand for exotic foreign travel, and the savings to pay for it.

Thailand could starting ramping up back to mass tourism this summer if they simply announce that they will accept verifiably fully-innoculated visitors on the pre-pandemic visa terms (i.e. no tests, no quarantine, no paperwork, no special insurance etc). Each visitor would need to have credible verification that they received their final jab at least two weeks prior.

400 million people are fully-vaccinated, while another 400m have received a first jab and are waiting for their second. The supply is growing and we expect to have a billion fully-vaccinated humans by the end of June.

The current hold up is the official verification schemes. Israel launched theirs in February, the UK launched theirs earlier this month, and the EU are beta-testing theirs, individual governments will probably roll it out during July. All national schemes will provide the basic info that Thailand needs to know that the holder is not a biological threat to Thailand: date of shot(s) and type of vaccine(s).

To have any sort of high season this year, Thailand should announce during June that, from the second half of the year (July 1st), the doors are wide open to fully-vaccinated tourists who arrive on planes carrying only fully-vaccinated passengers and crew. They won't get anywhere near 2019 levels this year but it will be a start, will give them some sort of high season, will kickstart a complicated industry that has stalled badly, and will pre-empt regional competitors eager to leapfrog them.

 

Yes great ideas! And kids? They don’t get vaccines (yet). That means only singles and couples then.