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Fauci: US should consider vaccine mandate for domestic air travel

Published:Monday | December 27, 2021 | 4:19 PM
Dr Anthony Fauci, White House Chief Medical Advisor and Director of the NIAID and Dr Rochelle Walensky, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, arrive to participate in the White House COVID-19 Response Team's regular call with the National Governors Association in the South Court Auditorium in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House Campus, Monday, December 27, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Dr Anthony Fauci, the top United States infectious disease expert, said Monday America should consider a vaccination mandate for domestic air travel, signalling a potential embrace of an idea the Biden administration has previously eschewed, as COVID-19 cases spike.

Fauci, President Joe Biden's chief science adviser on the pandemic response, said such a mandate might drive up the nation's lagging vaccination rate as well as confer stronger protection on flights, for which federal regulations require all those aged 2 and older to wear a mask.

“When you make vaccination a requirement, that's another incentive to get more people vaccinated,” Fauci told MSNBC.

“If you want to do that with domestic flights, I think that's something that seriously should be considered.”

The Biden administration has thus far balked at imposing a vaccination requirement for domestic air travel.

Two officials said Biden's science advisers have yet to make a formal recommendation for such a requirement to the president.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said a vaccine mandate on planes could trigger a host of logistical and legal concerns.

The US currently mandates that most foreign nationals travelling to the US be fully vaccinated against the coronavirus, though citizens and permanent residents only need to show proof of a negative test taken within a day of boarding.

Federal rules don't require people travelling by air within the US to show a negative test. Hawaii requires travellers to test or show proof of vaccination to avoid a mandatory quarantine.

Earlier this year the White House explored a domestic vaccination requirement for flights, or one requiring either vaccination or proof of negative test.

But officials have not been eager to mandate vaccination for domestic air travel because they expected it to face immediate legal challenges, mitigating its potential effectiveness as a tool to drive up vaccinations.

Pressed last week on why Biden had not mandated vaccinations for domestic air travel, White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters that “we know that masking can be, is, very effective on airplanes.”

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