Logan passengers to heed isolation edict
‘People will start to take this more seriously’
Some travelers entering Massachusetts on Friday by train or plane said they’ll follow Gov. Charlie Baker’s edict to stay home for two weeks to help stop the spread of coronavirus.
“I definitely plan on doing it, because I know especially around here the rates keep going up on this,” said Burlington native Chris DeMartinis, who landed at Logan International Airport on Friday afternoon from Tennessee.
A masked airport worker handed DeMartinis a flier as he walked out of Terminal C, urging travelers from out of state to “self-quarantine and monitor your health for 14 days.”
“At first, I think people were like, ‘This is ridiculous, whatever.’ I think now with how people are being affected and more and more deaths, people will start to take this more seriously,” DeMartinis said.
The fliers won’t just be distributed at Logan. Workers at South Station and Worcester Airport will also hand them out to travelers in those locations. Along the Massachusetts Turnpike, digital billboards also implore travelers to stay home.
“It changes how I feel about traveling around to different states and visiting family,” Boston resident Victoria Witczak said Friday outside South Station. She said she approved of the step by the state: “There’s so much global and national travel.”
But some people think the measure, which is an advisory and not an order, will do little to affect the speed of local transmission.
“Self-quarantine’s not going to work, because if they’re not showing any symptoms, people are just going to blow by it,” said Boston resident Al Tiberi. “I’d be more concerned with taking temperatures of people at the airports.”