Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly calls on airlines to clarify their COVID testing plans for UK flights

Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly is calling on all airlines to make clear if and how they are testing passengers before they fly to Australia from COVID-hammered nations like Britain.

Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly. Picture: Gary Ramage

The Chief Medical Officer is ­calling on airlines to make clear if and how they are testing ­passengers before they fly to ­Australia from COVID-hammered nations.

As thousands of Australians try to leave Britain and other pandemic-ravaged countries, Paul Kelly has also said recently vaccinated entrants into Australia will still have to quarantine for 14 days for the foreseeable future.

Professor Kelly, who took the role permanently this month, is not ready to enforce pre-flight COVID tests for Australians trying to leave Britain, despite pressure from some health experts and the Victorian government.

“I would say that Qantas some time ago had already introduced their own testing regime in relation to pre-flight testing and so Qantas are mostly the ones associated with our assisted flights,” Professor Kelly said in Canberra.

“We understand Singapore Airlines is also doing that and (Health) Minister (Greg) Hunt has requested I write to other airlines coming into Australia to make sure we know what they are doing in relation to pre-flight testing.”

Victorian Health Minister Martin Foley this week called on the federal government to require all Australians to provide proof of a negative result to a COVID-19 test before they are allowed into the country.

Professor Kelly said on Wednesday recent results from the UK suggested the mutant COVID strain in London was slightly more infectious but not more deadly.

“Public Health England provided interim results of their examination of that issue in the UK overnight … this variant is not more severe, doesn’t cause more severe illness,” he said. “There is no increase in hospitalisation or increase in 28-day mortality. It does appear that it is more transmissible, but not ­majorly so.”

As Britain and the US begin their emergency vaccination rollouts, Professor Kelly said the Australian Health Protection Principal Committeewas ­con­sidering “vaccination passports” to let foreigners into Australia, but he said it would take some months before any vaccinated person could enter the nation without doing 14 days’ quarantine.