Can I travel to Australia?
Although it's not possible to travel to Australia right now, its international borders are set to reopen by the end of 2021, around the moment of Christmas in the fourth week of December. Australia's Tourism Minister Dan Tehan said that there are some tasks that need to be done in order to make the reopening happen on time.
One of them is to achieve a minimum of a fully-vaccinated population rate, which is 80% of the national population. Meanwhile, about 38% of Australians had received both doses of the Covid-19 vaccine per 22 September.
International arrival terms and conditions
In another hand, international visitors are allowed to visit Australia with certain terms and conditions. One of them is that every traveler needs to verify that they are fully vaccinated before entering the country.
However, only several categories are exempted from Australia's travel restrictions, for example, Australian citizens, permanent residents, immediate family members of Australian citizens or permanent residents, and some other categories.
Vaccine passport
In order to prepare for the major reopening in December, the Australian government is planning to use a vaccine passport scheme with a number of major travel destinations through Australia's diplomatic missions overseas.
The good news is Singapore is included in the initial plan, along with Japan, South Korea, the UK, and the USA. Hopefully, this scheme will make it easier for the countries to travel, as far as without having to undergo a mandatory quarantine upon arrival.
However, Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison hoped that, if quarantine required, travelers arriving in Australia would be able to do it at home instead of the quarantine hotels.
Flight to Australia
Following the reopening plan, air travel access would be another thing that raised concern. Tehan said that the government is working with airlines to accommodate the possible increase of traffic in and out of Australia via air travel.
Australian airline Qantas as well as Jetstar plan to resume international flights by the end of October 2021. However, fewer planes will run on each route and fewer passengers would be in every flight to maintain the health protocols. To complement the protocols, Qantas is looking into several digital vaccine passports to be used by the passengers.
Australia shut its borders to non-residents since March 2020 and continues the limitation with the mandatory quarantine system. The Australian government also imposed rules to prevent Australians from leaving the country.
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