Be open to most vaccines

vACCineS developed by countries like China and Russia should be accepted by nations as part of a safe resumption of international travel, an expert in population health from Curtin University believes.

Speaking with Travel Daily yesterday, Professor Jaya A R Dantas said despite the perceived scepticism from many countries to accept vaccinated travellers who have had China’s Sinopharm or Russia’s Sputnik jabs for example, available data shows that they are effective against viral transmission.

“At this stage we should allow these vaccines because all of them are between 65% and 95% effective,” Dantas said.

While many countries are baulking at allowing entry for people vaccinated with pharmaceutical brands outside of those most recognised among western nations such as Pfizer and Moderna, Dantas said that the sheer volume of people who had already received vaccines like Sinopharm had demonstrated its safety and efficacy.

“I think it will be fine because [China] has vaccinated over a billion people, nearly 1.3 billion people and they are closely monitoring their Delta outbreak in Wuhan carefully,” she said.

Commenting on Qantas’ recent decision to mandate its staff to get vaccinated (TD 18 Aug), Dantas labelled the move a “necessary step” for aviation to restart safely internationally.

“Qantas is not the first airline to do this, other airlines in the United States and Canada have already mandated vaccines for their staff, United Airlines has 90% of their pilots vaccinated and 80% of their crew, while Canada has set vaccine mandates as required for all federal employees, rail employees, airline employees and transportation workers by Oct,” Dantas said.

MeAnwHile Singapore Airlines has this week mandated that its frontline workers be fully jabbed by 01 Sep.