Proof of vaccine may enable travel, reduce quarantine time: Qantas boss Alan Joyce

Qantas boss Alan Joyce has revealed plans are afoot to slash quarantine periods for foreign arrivals in Australia.

Qantas CEO Alan Joyce has revealed international travellers will have to provide proof of vaccination when overseas flights eventually resume. Picture: Bianca De Marchi/AAP

Qantas boss Alan Joyce has revealed the airline will require proof of vaccine from travellers when international flights resume next year.

Speaking on A Current Affair, Mr Joyce outlined the measures being explored by the airline in partnership with the federal government to try to facilitate more overseas flights.

He said passengers on repatriation flights currently being operated by Qantas were being tested prior to boarding and upon arrival in Darwin, with the aim of potentially reducing the mandatory quarantine period from 14-days to seven or even five.

“We’re also testing wastewater on the aircraft as well to check if someone on the aircraft had COVID-19, and that’s producing some promising results,” Mr Joyce said.

“There’s a lot of activity taking place. If we don’t get a vaccine, absolutely testing is the way to reduce the amount of quarantine required.”

In the event a vaccine does become available Mr Joyce said Qantas and many other airlines around the world would require travellers to have proof of vaccination before boarding an overseas flight.

“We’re looking at changing our terms and conditions,” he said.

“I think that’s going to be a common there around the globe. What we’re looking at is how you can have the vaccination (recorded) in an electronic version of a passport that certifies what the vaccine is, if it’s acceptable the country you’re travelling to.

“There’s a lot of logistics, a lot of technology that need to be put in place to make this happen.”

Mr Joyce’s comments were reflected by the International Air Transport Association which is in the final stages of developing a digital health pass, considered the key to safely reopening borders.

IATA’s annual general meeting heard the pass would manage and verify the secure flow of necessary testing or vaccine information among governments, airlines, laboratories and travellers.

IATA managing director Alexandre de Juniac said the association would bring its own travel pass to the market in coming months to meet the needs of various travel bubbles and public health corridors.

“Today borders are double locked. Testing is the first key to enable international travel without quarantine measures,” Mr de Juniac said.

“The second key is the global information infrastructure needed to securely manage, share and verify test data matched with traveller identities in compliance with border control requirements.”

Since the COVID crisis erupted, international air travel has all but ground to a halt, with Qantas suspending all commercial overseas flights from late March.

The most recent federal government indications were that international borders were unlikely to be relaxed until the end of 2021, in the absence of an effective COVID vaccine.

Mr Joyce has suggested Qantas would not resume any significant international flying until July 2021, and services to the US and the UK were unlikely to happen before December 2021.

Travel bubbles between Australia and other countries who have COVID-19 well under control such as New Zealand, South Korea and Singapore are expected to open up in coming months.

Qantas has placed most of its international fleet into storage, including 12 A380s, and most of its 787-9s and A330s.

The airline also brought forward the retirement of its five remaining Boeing 747s in July.

A total of 241 pilots have taken voluntary redundancy or early retirement equivalent to the loss of close 5 million flying hours.

On the domestic front, Qantas hopes to return to 50 or 60 per cent of pre-COVID capacity in December, providing state borders reopen.