Tag Archives for cdc.
The holdings in two recent court rulings against the CDC’s eviction moratorium have caused questions about the legality of the Biden administration’s transportation mask mandate. The mask mandate goes beyond the specified example powers in the statute cited by CDC for its authority, and Congress may not have been able to delegate broader unspecified powers to the CDC even if it had wanted to.
The CDC has issued a new directive requiring passengers arriving from Ebola-stricken countries to provide contact information on arrival.
This applies to anyone who has been in either Guinea or the Democratic Republic of the Congo in the past 21 days, and applies to arrivals at New York JFK, Newark, Atlanta, Chicago O’Hare, Los Angeles and Washington Dulles. This covers roughly 60 passengers per day on average. The CDC imposed and bungled similar rules at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.
A CDC official has said that the Biden Administration is actively considering requiring a negative Covid-19 test for domestic flights and not just for international flights to the U.S. which is now in place.
However American Airlines CEO Doug Parker made clear to employees that this ‘rumor’ has ‘no basis in reality.’
I warned you this would happen, but you supported a federal mask mandate anyway. Airlines already required mask-wearing on planes. I told you that if the federal government got involved this would mean fewer options for travels, and less mask-wearing overall. Guess which one of us was right?
Late Friday night the CDC issued its rule for mask-wearing on public transportation and airlines following the President’s executive order asking them to do so….
The U.S. is now considering requiring testing not just for international travel back to the U.S. but for domestic travel as well.
There may have been merit in this a year ago. Now it’s unlikely to make a big difference. Both in the past, and now, the challenge for effectiveness is availability of cheap widespread at-home tests that people can take every day.
As of today the U.S. now requires a negative Covid-19 test within 3 days prior to departure, or documentation of having already recovered from Covid-19, for all air passengers flying to the country (citizens and non-citizens alike).
Here are 8 things to know about this new requirement.
Back in November I predicted that mask disputes on planes would become more common over the winter and that seems to becoming the case, at least based on social media reports and continued reporting from airlines on the number of people banned over masks. Even tiny Alaska Airlines is now over 300 passengers banned.
Starting January 26 the CDC will require all passengers flying to the U.S. to have received a negative Covid-19 test within 3 days of travel. For everything else that’s been written about the new requirement, it’s likely to accelerate mask disputes since everyone on board will have tested negative on flights to the U.S. already.
This new testing requirement isn’t going to control spread of the virus, which is already running rampant throughout most of the country. It isn’t going to stop entry of new variants of the virus, which are already here (and which we’re doing little tracking of in any case).
We need fewer barriers to low-cost at-home testing. We need greater tracking of new variants of the virus. We need more rapid approval and deployment both for Covid-19 treatments and vaccines. A travel ban that applies internationally, but that does nothing to limit spread via travel within the United States, at what’s likely the tail end of the pandemic is purely cosmetic but may have long-lasting consequences.
Starting January 26 the U.S. will require a negative Covid-19 test within 3 days prior to departure, or documentation of having already recovered from Covid-19, for everyone arriving in the country (citizens and non-citizens alike).
This applies to air passengers only. Anyone who wishes will still be able to fly to Mexico for instance, and drive across the U.S. border.
The CDC has issued a ‘strong’ recommendation for mask wearing on planes, rideshares and across public transportation. Yes, in October. And there are three reasons this will make no difference whatsoever for air travel.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
