Looking to drive people from planes and ports to locked down quarantine facilities? Australia may have a job for you. According to reports in Australian media, vendors of quarantine facilities are being offered contracts into the late 2020’s, rather than a year or two, as most would hope.
As the rest of the world begins to reopen, and noted experts argue against the logic of most current travel related restrictions for vaccinated people, Australia appears to be adding even greater confusion to their laboring reopening plans.
It’s unlikely all tourism arrivals would still be subject to lengthy quarantine for years to come, but at this point, who knows.
The country seems keen to return to its time as a prison colony. Only this time, it’s people locked in from the inside, rather than being sent away to the South Pacific from abroad. Planning travel to Australia certainly isn’t getting any easier.
Australia Adds Travel Confusion
According to News.com.au, even hesitant epidemiologists are scratching their heads, after leaks emerged showing that certain Australian territories are offering contracts for travel quarantine vendors to staff and operate the tight facilities well past 2025.
Australia stunned the world in July, with plans to cut back current arrivals by 50%, which will see even many citizens and residents struggling to return to the country until 2022. People are still barred from leaving, unless exempted.
Beginning in 2022, the new arrival caps could return to the old caps, which would allow more citizens and residents back in, but still ban all outside visitors.
From this time, arrivals could, possibly, be allowed to quarantine at home, but details remain scarce. No plans to exempt fully vaccinated people from quarantine exist at this point, either. With so many questions about when even Australia citizens will be able to travel normally, it’s all but impossible to predict when visitors could enter.
But, details of new plans from the Department of Infrastructure, Planning and Logistics to staff and operate quarantine facilities for at least another 5 years paint unfortunate pictures for the future.
The quarantine facility at Darwin is offering work contracts for bus vendors and other operators through 2025, signaling that many tourist arrivals to the country could still be forced into supervised hotel accommodations for years to come. Could they remain for unvaccinated people only? Let’s hope.
Asked about the potential long term development, News.com.au got a gem of a quote out of Peter Collignon, a leading Australian epidemiologist from the Australian National University, who stated…
“Five years seems a bit long,”
Peter Collignon, epidemiologist
Travel Plans On Hold
Just last week, New Zealand quashed any hopes of travel in 2021, but laid out clear intentions to welcome vaccinated visitors – and vaccinated visitors only – from some point in 2022. Australia, however, remains a complete mystery in terms of tangible dates.
Until Australian leaders catch up on vaccination rates and announce clear and unified plans for tourism arrivals, there’s absolutely no point in even planning travel to the lovely Pacific nation, let alone booking any.
Testing… testing.
Vaccination.
Testing… testing.
Lockdown for vaccinated.
Only ‘chosen’ can probably travel.
Paying hotels … not allowing singles to quarantine in empty units and houses…
Vote for the same!
No confusion. If that’s what it takes to keep Australia safe. So be it. Mark McGowan has a ring of steel around WA, so we are enjoying life COVID free. WA has a policy of Zero COVID in the community. If you want to travel go somewhere else other than Australia.
Until when?
Do you think COVID is going away? Do you think vaccines provide fool-proof immunity?
What if the virus is endemic — here to stay? Then what? Lock them in forever? Bubble Island?
What will happen when the bubble is bursting ? I liv in Australia and cant get home , every day in 20 months , I tell myself ,how can i get home, and now I say , glad Im not there. I luv Australia but not in isolation , thats not living. And then people will say, its better to isolated than get Covid , and then the bubble burst ?
Up until now I’ve been pretty impressed with Australia’s response to Covid. The big problem is, they simply can’t rely on isolation and shutdowns as they seem increasingly inclined to do. They simply must get their population vaccinated.
“Five years seems a bit long,”
Have I not been saying that it will be at least five years before the mania blows itself out? The lockdowns, masks, quarantines, and the stupid attempts to impose Zero Covid will continue until 2025 at least. Masks – do you really think that will end in Jan of 2022??? They know that gradual strangulation will work. People get accustomed to incrementally more rules and then some are hired to impose the next steps on the masses. So far, from March of 2020, I haven’t missed once.