Opening Borders During The Pandemic

In the first phase of the covid-19 pandemic, nearly all governments in the world closed their borders to people entering and leaving their home countries. As months passed by, the urge to relax increased and regulations slowly decreased. This helped national economies at a standstill ease the pressure.

However, governments worldwide were keen not to relax all rules because the pandemic threat was still high. Governments weighed their options and then, took action. The governmental sectors with the ability to more quickly revamp the economies were given priority.

Level of vaccination

Some countries want to vaccinate all their citizens before opening the borders. According to many national leaders, vaccinating their citizens against covid-19 will protect them from getting infected with the virus. An example is Australia, where the government embarked on a massive vaccination program that started in February 2021.

According to a Senior Health official, this nation is not expected to open its borders in 2021, even after the vaccination program is complete. Speaking to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the health secretary boss, Dr. Murphy, said he thinks the nation will go on with strict border closing policies for most of 2021. This is because the government wants to ensure that the vaccine will be able to protect the citizens. However, other countries will be opening their borders soon, and tourists will be able to enjoy traveling again.

Tourism economies

The nations that suffered most economically were those that depend on tourism. Some countries closed their international borders, making it a temporary decision. Other nations like Mexico kept their borders open. The border remained open to Americans and the only requirement was a temperature check at the point of entry. This allowed many Americans to enjoy traveling still and Mexico to support their economy.

According to a report, Americans visiting Mexico spent close to $25 billion in 2019. The nation hoped to continue tapping into this sector in 2020 and beyond. Tanzania, another tourist nation, didn’t close its international borders either. The former president even declared the country pandemic-free and encouraged visitors to visit the nation.

Kenya kept its international borders closed for about four months and then relaxed the rules for international flights, although visitors now have to abide by the nation’s strict pandemic restrictions.

The international relations experts, from whom you can read more on Studyclerk, the leading portal where you get research paper for sale online, say that the pandemic has devastated many economies of nations around the world while governments are doing their best to protect their citizens from the virus. However, currently, nearly all institutions of higher learning have been opened and students have resumed normal learning, which is great news. All nations will slowly go back to normal soon.

Monitoring red alert nations

Nearly all European nations closed their borders, with some relaxing the rules later and re-opening them. The UK is a good example of European nations that opened their borders. According to the EU, closing borders didn’t offer enough solutions for controlling the spread of the disease.

The UK decided to use a different approach to help control the spread. It formed an advisory commission that monitored how the different waves of the pandemic were spreading within each nation and advised the government on what steps to take.

Nations that seemed to have increased infections in a short period were marked as red alert nations. Consequently, travel restriction was placed on citizens of that specific nation.

Multi-sector economies

The UAE relies on different governmental sectors to drive its economies forward. UAE members like Dubai rely heavily on tourism and trade while other members rely on oil and other forms of mining. Any visitor vising or passing through the UAE and specifically Dubai have to follow strict requirements.

Any UAE citizen or visitor coming from or through Nigeria and South Africa must undergo a COVID test at the point of entry. Visitors coming from nations regarded as high transmitting must get a mandatory test at the Dubai International Airport before being allowed to enter Dubai.

Those transiting through Dubai must provide test certificates of tests done not more than 72 hours from the time of travel. From the look of these restrictions, Dubai and the UAE are doing their best to place themselves as post-pandemic travel destinations.

Because of the ongoing challenges caused by the pandemic around the world, government decisions keep changing depending on how serious the pandemic is at any given time. University students writing an academic work about the current situation could get confused because of the fast rate at which decisions are changing.

Encouraging domestic tourism

Costa Rica earns more than $1.7 billion annually from tourism, with American tourists accounting for more than half. The government had to weigh between allowing international tourists to visit the nation or keeping the borders shut and continue suffering economically.

Eventually, the government decided to open doors for domestic tourists and monitor the situation. If the situation seems promising, they will open the doors for foreign tourism, which will bring much-awaited relief to the already overstressed economy.

Tourism, directly and indirectly, employs more than 600,000 citizens and all these families lost their sources of income. The tourism sector hopes that the pandemic will end soon so that the nations return to normal operations, which will most likely happen this year.

As the world enters into the third and fourth phase of the pandemic, governments are not resting as their decision-makers engage in active situation monitoring and action reporting. Weighing against the first wave, governments seem more relaxed on adding further restrictions than they did in early 2020. There is a need to be more careful on imposing restrictions that can hurt the economies further. All in all, we are heading in the right direction and at the right pace, so let’s keep a positive mindset going further.