International travelers from nations such as Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, New Zealand, Australia and Canada would be added later, Ige said. Ige said the state isn’t likely to expand vaccination exemptions to domestic trans-Pacific travelers until summer. Qualifying interisland travelers may begin entering their vaccination information into Safe Travels Hawaii,, on May 7 for travel on or after May 11. Unvaccinated children age 5 and above who are traveling with qualifying interisland travelers also will need to get a pre-test. Hawaii’s new vaccination exemption allows qualifying interisland travelers to bypass the state’s 10-day travel quarantine without going through the Safe Travels Hawaii pre-testing program or post-arrival county testing.īut the program doesn’t yet allow travelers who were vaccinated in Hawaii and are entering Hawaii on trans-Pacific flights to be exempt from the quarantine. We continue to work to improve the systems and programs in order to keep our community safe and reenergize our economy.” 1 priority remains protecting the health and well-being of Hawaii’s citizens. “We are monitoring and continue to monitor the rate of virus activity in our community, hospitalizations and fatalities here caused by COVID-19,” Ige said. Ige said the phased approach would allow officials to “validate the screening process.” He said it also would allow the state and counties to “learn about what kinds of bottlenecks and delays it may inject into our screening process for interisland travel.” Ige said state and county mayors decided to start the vaccination exemption program with those who had been vaccinated in Hawaii because “we can verify the information and their vaccination status.” It would just be terrible if Hawaii loses summer again.” “They’ll cancel if that doesn’t happen, and we’ll have to refund the money. “We’ve got people that have forward bookings for six months from now that are betting on a vaccination exemption,” he said. It will get us back to normal with occupancy, and as important as all that is, it trickles down to the businesses that depend on visitors coming.”īraman said he supports the state’s phased-in approach to loosening travel restrictions but said Hawaii needs to loosen trans-Pacific travel restrictions before summer or risk losing another peak travel season. It will allow us to have all of our employees back to work. “Once it opens to the mainland, it will have a huge impact. “We do good interisland business now, and I think this will be a great reason for people to travel and celebrate, so we have high hopes for the next couple of months with this,” Braman said. Jim Braman, general manger of The Cliffs at Princeville, said getting to the point where the state and community feel comfortable with easing restrictions for vaccinated kamaaina travelers has been a long time coming. We’re hearing that and the surveys are showing that.” “There’s no denying that pent-up demand is still there, and part of the reason is that the people who are coming are having a great time. “It’s important that our visitors continue to feel welcome,” Hannemann said. Hannemann said the slow approach helps to address some of the resident hostility and dissatisfaction toward tourism that emerged during the pandemic. Mufi Hannemann, president and CEO of the Hawaii Lodging & Tourism Association, said the advantage of first easing restrictions for kamaaina travelers is that it allows residents to see that tourism is for their benefit. “We still aren’t where we need to be, but hopefully this will make people more comfortable with travelers.” There’s lots of people staying and eating at Grandma’s house,” he said. “Interisland travel spending is way less by nature. Keith Vieira, principal at KV & Associates, Hospitality Consulting, said, “it’s a positive step that Hawaii is moving in the direction of a vaccination passport and that it’s happening on all islands.” Still, members of Hawaii’s visitor industry said Tuesday that they viewed the state’s limited vaccination exemption program as a good start that hopefully will create a pathway to ease trans-Pacific travel restrictions before summer bookings are lost. without getting tested for the coronavirus or going into quarantine. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its travel guidance to say fully vaccinated people can travel within the U.S. Ige’s decision came more than two weeks after the U.S. David Ige announced Tuesday that Hawaii will begin accepting a vaccination exemption on May 11 for interisland travelers who received their vaccination in Hawaii and have completed the required 14-day waiting period. Traveling between the Hawaiian Islands will get easier next month for people who have been vaccinated in Hawaii, but a major bump in travel demand isn’t likely to come until the entry process for trans-Pacific travelers becomes less complicated.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |