Heathrow Airport have once again, called to the government to introduce Covid-19 tests at UK airports after a reported a 88% drop in traffic at the airport during July, putting figures down to the government’s mandatory quarantine for arrivals from key overseas destinations for the fact that 60% of the airport’s routes remain grounded.
Over half of the 480,000 passengers who flew from Heathrow in July were travelling to European summer holiday destinations to where the UK has opened quarantine-free ‘travel corridors’ but 40% of flights, mainly to long-haul and predominantly business destinations, remain grounded.
Heathrow chief executive John Holland-Kaye said: “Tens of thousands of jobs are being lost because Britain remains cut off from critical markets such as the US, Canada and Singapore.
“The government can save jobs by introducing testing to cut quarantine from higher risk countries, while keeping the public safe from a second wave of Covid.”
Heathrow Airport has suggested it could have testing measures put in place by early September, but ministers have rejected pleas to introduce Covid-19 tests at UK airports as a replacement for quarantine measures, claiming that a mandatory 14-day self-isolation for arrivals from higher-risk countries is a better way to prevent the virus spreading.
