The State Department said the pandemic continues to pose “unprecedented risks” to travelers: “In light of those risks, the Department of State strongly recommends U.S. citizens reconsider all travel abroad.”
The increased alert level comes as the number of vaccinated Americans is increasing and COVID-19 restrictions are being lifted in many states and in some countries. Iceland, Croatia, Greece and Israel are among the countries welcoming or about to welcome vaccinated Americans, notes usatoday.
In early April, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said fully vaccinated Americans can resume domestic and international travel at low risk to themselves. But it noted that international travel poses additional risks given the spread of new COVID-19 variants.
Despite the new guidance for vaccinated travelers, the CDC says, people should stay home.
Millions of Americans are ρεπορτεδλυ ignoring the advice, with travel rising steadily this spring, according to Transportation Security Administration screening numbers and optimism about bookings from airline executives.
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I have seen the ECDC (European Centre for Disease Prevention & Control) stats showing Greece as amazingly green. Firstly Greece is green for under 4% covid positivity from their testing. Yet by Greece’s own published figures they have only had one day of less than 4% positivity since 5th March. In respect of testing Greece is also super green. That means testing 5,000 per 100,000 population in the past week, basically that’s 5% of the population. So for Greece around 535,000 tests in the week. But again Greece’s own published figures show that they have never achieved that with PCR / Rapid testing in any 7 day period since the start of the pandemic.
Judging only on positivity rate might be misleading.
The increase of number of tests does not mean you will get the equivalent yield in detected infected persons. Initially this is linear, but later on, it levels off, and it simply does not make sense to increase number of tests (unless you wish to display low positivity rate).
Also, note that it also depends in which region the most of the tests are conducted and what constitutes the primary reason for testing: among people having some symptoms, the number of positive cases will be much larger than other groups.
If you wish to judge the state you need to consider all of the following:
1. total number of tests
2. total positives
3. positivity rate (calculated from 1 and 2)
4. daily deaths (the only real parameter that can be used to calculated actual number of positive people 2-4 weeks ago).
5. daily intubations. In this case Greece demonstrates way more cases than it should proportional to the population and reported number of positives, e.g. 3,5 times more than Germany. Does this mean that the infection rate is 3,5 times larger or a result of a different medical protocols?
Well of course they have put Greece on the no go list, what does Greece expect with things as they are. That’s why the UK government have not confirmed a data as to when people can start to holiday in Greece.
If the report of the India strain found in patras is correct, then I am pretty sure that the USA government already know about it.
While I’m on the subject of tourists, just let me mention this.
Greece recently announced that Ukrainian tourists are welcome, please don’t concern yourselves about thousands of Ukrainian tourists flocking to Greece.
My wife is Ukranian, used to work in the medical profession, has family and friends who are doctors in Ukraine that the total amount of Ukrainians that have had both vaccine injections is…………5 yes!!!!! That’s right 5. Assuming they can afford to have pcr tests, and the cost of the vacation, that’s all the Ukraine’s that could come here for now.