Europe mulls how to get tourists back … 2 meters apart

This news has been read 8144 times!

Fears of being quarantined abroad

AYIA NAPA, Cyprus, May 20, (AP): The Mediterranean resort town of Ayia Napa is known for its boisterous parties. Each summer, thousands of young foreign tourists pack the dance floors of its nightlife district after a day at the beach.
But the pandemic silenced the exuberant Napa Strip district as the island nation of Cyprus went into a lockdown to halt the spread of the coronavirus. Now nightclub owners wonder when social distancing rules will be eased enough for the party to resume — and what those new parties will look like.
“We know at nightclubs, young people will go to dance and have a good time. But then you have to tell them that they have to keep 2 meters (6 feet) apart from each other?” asked Charalambos Alexandrou, the spokesman for a group representing local clubs, bars and restaurants.
Across southern Europe, in places where tourism drives much of the economy, officials are weighing how to entice travelers to come back, even while the pandemic remains a threat. Juggling the sometimes-competing needs of health and business, authorities are introducing measures to reassure visitors that taking a holiday is safe again.
Social distancing rules may work in restaurants, but that’s not likely to solve the quandary facing Ayia Napa’s nightclubs. Alexandrou said this will be “a season of trying to survive,” not seeking a profit.
One idea being considered is asking holidaymakers to take a COVID-19 test prior to their arrival. Cyprus has officially reported 916 cases of COVID-19 and 17 deaths.
The country’s deputy minister for tourism, Savvas Perdios, said Cyprus will initially look to bring tourists from nearby countries that have managed to contain the virus — Greece, Israel, the United Arab Emirates and some central European and Nordic nations.
Authorities will take more time to assess the course of the pandemic in the United Kingdom and Russia, the island’s primary tourism markets, before rolling out the red carpet for those countries.
Tourists in the near future will have to navigate a different set of expectations, routines and rules to counter the virus.
Christos Angelides, president of the Cyprus Hotel Managers’ Association, said new rules being announced soon will mean that from the moment tourists step out of their bus or taxi from the airport, their luggage will be disinfected and taken straight to their rooms. Reception procedures will be done electronically, with employees behind a plexiglass screen and cleaning staff in full protective gear.
Guests eyeing a vacation in Portugal, another major southern European holiday destination, will probably look beyond a hotel’s online reviews to see if it has the “Clean&Safe” seal now being awarded by local tourism officials. The seal indicates that the establishment, be it a hotel, restaurant or other venue, has enacted recommended hygiene and safety procedures to protect against the virus.
The idea has been a big success in a desperate sector that accounts for 15% of Portugal’s gross domestic product and 9% of the country’s jobs. The online classes needed to obtain the seal are being attended by around 4,000 people a week.
“It’s a question of making people feel safe to travel and having confidence in the place where they’re going,” said Luís Araújo, president of the government agency Turismo de Portugal.
Portugal lies at the opposite end of the Mediterranean Sea from Cyprus, but its challenge is the same: how to reconcile social distancing and hygiene rules with fun and relaxation.
“Restrictions scare away any tourist,” Araújo acknowledged.
The Portuguese government says discotheques will be the last places to open, but many hotels intend to start reopening June 1.
Among the changes being adopted: Guests will not check into their rooms until 24 hours after the last occupant has checked out, to allow time for thorough cleaning and airing of the space. Waiting for sunbeds may come to an end as some hotel guests will get one for their own exclusive use. Buffets are unlikely to be offered, but room service is expected to thrive.
Another challenge is how to reopen southern Europe’s famous beaches.
Portugal has come up with a plan to get people back on the sand starting on June 6. Sunbathers must stay 1.5 meters (5 feet) apart, with umbrellas at least 3 meters (10 feet) apart. New signs and an app will use a traffic-light system of red, yellow and green indicating which beaches are full, partly full or have few people. Paddle boats and water slides will be prohibited.
In an attempt to shore up public confidence, Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa went to his local cafe for morning coffee and had lunch at a Lisbon restaurant with the speaker of parliament on Monday, the first day those businesses reopened after a lockdown. Even with all the efforts to make tourists feel safe, worries about the coronavirus are not going away.
UK personal trainer Kenny Dyer canceled an Easter vacation in Cyprus and is hopeful of venturing back in October. But Dyer attached a condition that governments may find hard to guarantee.
“I wouldn’t want to fly somewhere where there’s a sudden spike in coronavirus cases, and I would have to be quarantined abroad,” Dyer said.
Also:
AUSTIN, Texas: Republican Gov Greg Abbott gave permission to reopen practically every facet of daily life in Texas, including bars and child daycare centers, lifting most full lockdown orders as the state continues one of the nation’s swiftest reboots from coronavirus restrictions.
Abbott’s sweeping new orders, which he described as a second phase in Texas’ reopening, allows zoos and bowling alleys to resume business and lets restaurants and retailers expand the number of customers by the end of the week. They also set up the return of some professional sports, summer camps and summer school by June.
Abbott said social distancing measures must still be in place, such as limits on customers and no fans at sports events. Theme parks, however, remain closed.
The move pushes one of the world’s largest economies toward getting back to business as usual, even while the state has seen record numbers of daily new coronavirus cases and deaths. But Abbott has emphasized hospitalization rates that remain flat and infection rates that have dropped, even after Texas began lifting stay-at-home orders on May 1.
“We’ve seen no evidence, no signs, that raise any concerns about a possibility of retrenchment in Texas,” Abbott said.
Abbott did keep broad restrictions in two parts of Texas that are struggling with a surge of new cases, El Paso and Amarillo, for an additional week. He said the delay would give surge teams more time to get the flare-up of new cases under control.
Abbott said he can further push Texas open because the state has boosted daily testing and has seen a drop in the percentage of new cases. That infection rate was as high as 13 percent in mid-April and has dropped under 5 percent in recent days, according to state health officials.
Abbott also said the state has good hospital capacity and personal protective equipment to handle any dramatic increase in cases.
Under Abbott’s order, childcare facilities can reopen immediately. Restaurants will be able to open at 50 percent capacity on Friday — an increase from the current 25 percent — and bars, which had remained closed, to open at 25 percent. Bowling alleys will be allowed to open at 25 percent.
By June, youth sports and other camps will be allowed to open, and professional sports, including auto racing, golf, softball and tennis leagues can apply with the state to host events without spectators.
Theme parks are still being evaluated, Abbott said. Schools, which had been closed for the rest of the spring semester, can make plans to reopen for summer school with social distancing guidelines for in-person instruction. Universities can also reopen campus for the summer with similar guidelines. The order did not mention planning for college sports.
Democrats, including the mayors of several of the state’s largest cities, have criticized the plan as moving too fast, too soon.
“The people in the city of Houston we want things to open up. We want the economy to open up. We want people back on their jobs,” said Mayor Sylvester Turner, a Democrat. “I probably would choose a different pace than what he has chosen … My only hope and prayer is that several weeks from now, we are not going to see a spike occur.”
Few states have moved faster to reopen than Texas, where Abbott has warned that the numbers of new cases would rise as the state reopened and that has borne out. A nine-day streak of at least 1,000 new daily cases that ended Sunday saw the one-day infection rate hit a record-high of 1,801 on Saturday. The 110 deaths over last Thursday and Friday was easily the highest two-day fatality rate since the virus was first detected in the state.
The state reported 909 new cases Monday in about 30,000 new tests. Eleven new deaths were the lowest in a single day since March 31 when there were four. Mondays have typically been when the fewest new cases are reported.
State officials said the surge in new infections came after 700 cases were reported in the Amarillo area where Texas has sent a response team to try to contain a growing spread at meat-packing plants.
“When we increase testing in hotspots the number of people testing positive is going to spike,” Abbott said. “We will be prepared to deal with spikes.”

By Menelaos Hadjicostis and Barry Hatton

This news has been read 8144 times!