IATA app could restart international flights without quarantine

A new app, due to launch in a few weeks, could mark the first step in resuming international travel without quarantine.

The International Air Travel Association (IATA) travel app will allow governments and airlines to digitally collect, access and share information on the status of the Covid-19 test and vaccination of individual passengers .

The industry body, of which 290 airlines are members, said the tool will bring greater “efficiency” to health documentation checks, while speeding up the recovery of the hard-hit travel sector.

“It’s really about digitizing an existing process,” Nick Careen, IATA senior vice president for airport cargo and passenger security, told CNBC on Wednesday.

“This is the way to go, because if we do manual processing, we will stop the minute we start to see a restart,” he said.

Singapore Airlines will be the first carrier to operate the tool on an end-to-end link between London Heathrow. Thirty other airlines, including Air New Zealand, as well as Emirates and Etihad in the United Arab Emirates, are expected to conduct tests through March and April.

IATA is not the only one to develop so-called digital medical passports intended to boost cross-border travel. International agencies, governments and tech companies are also participating. But Careen said he hopes the app will establish a “minimum set of requirements” to allow for greater interoperability.

“Eventually, you’ll see a lot of people in this space,” he said, “but we’re setting the baseline in terms of what the standard should be.

With the new application and the continued deployment of vaccines, the association of global airlines estimates travel could reach around 50% of 2019 levels by the end of this year.

Analysts previously expected a larger increase in travel in early 2021, but the continued spread of the virus and the emergence of new strains have pushed those expectations back.

“This is the current economic forecast,” Careen said. “There are a lot of variables that go into this.”