Originally Posted by
Howmuch
I disagree, one by one all counties are lifting restrictions albeit like here on condition of a vaccine passport which is irrelevant because you still have to test before and after travelling so the vaccine passport brings nothing to the party other than control and coercion.
The test is only a single data point in time. Vaccinations massively reduce the risk of (1) you getting seriously sick while visiting a place and (2) you passing the illness on to someone else.
You could get a negative test result just before you become contagious, and then be spreading COVID around for a few days.
It's layered risk management.
Originally Posted by
Smiley90
As long as Americans aren't overwhelmingly against the travel ban, no amount of outside influence will matter, much as we'd all like it to, me included. I think the administration is probably weighing if allowing vaccinated travel is worth the domestic uproar against such a policy, since anti-vaccine sentiments are so prevalent here...
I agree that there is not a loud domestic constituency demanding the reopening of borders, and thus not much pressure on the administration to act.
I disagree about the uproar against requiring vaccinations for visitors. First, as we both agree, most Americans don't seem to care one way or another about foreign tourists/business travelers. Second, there is a rumor that the administration is going to impose a vaccine mandate on federal workers and contractors as early as tomorrow. If the administration thinks it can withstand blowback from requiring millions of Americans to be vaccinated (and the VA has already done so), then surely the blowback for requiring the same of foreign citizens will be less.