Coronavirus Effect: The US Imposes Travel Ban On All European Travelers Except Britons

As a fallout of the Coronavirus epidemic spreading to a greater number of countries and the increasing number of deaths, the United States has today imposed travel restrictions on citizens of all European countries excepting the United Kingdom. The world which has till now witnessed more than 120,000Â cases of infection and more than 4,000 confirmed dead as a result of the virus, has seen a number of countries impose such restrictions on travelers coming from countries most affected by the spread of the virus. The US restriction, which comes into effect from Friday the 13^th of this month, will continue for 30 days as the European continent grapples to contain the spread of the virus which, within a very short period of time, has infected thousands of people there.

Since the beginning of the outbreak, travel restrictions had been put in place by the United States on people travelling from China and other affected Asian countries. However, over a period of time as the virus spread across the world, several people who travelled from Europe to the United States carried the strain with them and are being held responsible for several infected clusters in that country. Lately, countries like Italy and Iran are being held responsible for much of the secondary transmission of the virus to many countries while themselves being impacted by travelers who brought the virus to their countries.

Italy, which reported its first case on 31 January 2020, saw an exponential increase in the number of cases in the next one and half months. By 11 March 2020 the country had 12,642 confirmed cases, with 827 dead from the pandemic and 1,045 having recovered. The country is also being held responsible for transmitting the virus to at least 30 more countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, Oceana and the Americas. On 9 March 2020, the government of the country has put the entire country on quarantine, allowing travel only in case of extreme emergency. The country as on 12 March 2020 is the second most affected country by the pandemic, after China. Several other countries in Europe have also been badly affected by the epidemic. Outside of Italy, Spain, France and Germany are the three most severely impacted countries registering 3,020 confirmed cases in Spain, 2,281 confirmed cases in France and 2,120 confirmed cases in Germany. Other European countries like Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands have also reported hundreds of infections.

The travel restrictions imposed by the United States as well as other countries, while protecting the populace of the respective countries, are having a disastrous effect on the world economy. Panic selling has led to massive sell-offs across global capital markets. Investors are concerned about the economic impact that the pandemic may have on the world economy and have started to shift their funds to safe-haven assets such as gold, whose prices are continuously rising since the outbreak was first reported. Central banks across the world have also started to respond to the pandemic. The Bank of England has finally cut its interest rates by 50 basis points in view of the mounting threat to the country’s economy. The central bank has cut its rates from 0.75 per cent to 0.25 per cent after its monetary policy committee in an unscheduled meeting voted unanimously in favor of a rate cut to confront this latest threat to the British economy. Last Tuesday, the Federal Reserve of the United States had also cut the US benchmark interest rates by half a percentage point and set it in the 1 per cent to 1.25 per cent range. The magnitude of the rate cut, not seen since the 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers, demonstrated how concerned the central bank was regarding the financial and economic impact of the virus outbreak. Federal Reserve chairman Jerome H. Powell, shortly after the rate cut announcement, said in an interview that the action was warranted as it was felt that the outbreak had reached a proportion where it posed a risk to the outlook of the US economy. On the same day, the Reserve Bank of Australia also cut its rates by a record half a percentage point to set a new record low of 0.5 per cent. The bank's governor, Philip Lowe, while speaking on the eve of the announcement had stated that the outbreak of the epidemic in overseas is having a significant impact on the Australian economy, particularly in the education and travel sectors. Japan has also announced contingency measures to offer aid of nearly $15 billion to businesses affected by the outbreak of the virus and public spending of nearly $4 billion to prop up the country’s economy. The European Central Bank, while not announcing any stimulus measures yet, has to convene a meeting of its functionaries in Frankfurt to deliberate on the crisis while German chancellor Angela Merkel has pledged that her government will do whatever it takes to wheatear the storm. Other than the above, several other countries have also announced both monetary and policy measures to deal with the pandemic. The World Bank, on its part, has announced an aid of $12 billion to countries which are fighting to contain the epidemic.

The countries of the European Union, while criticizing the US move, have stated that the decision was unilaterally taken and that a coordinated effort was required to fight the pandemic where dialogue is an essential component. The global airline industry has been the hardest hit by this epidemic. Several small and large airline companies from across the world have been issuing profit warnings amidst falling passenger numbers and an increasing number of cancellations. So is also the situation with the global travel and tourism industry, which is also projecting a significant drop in its revenues due to a fewer number of people preferring to travel for leisure or business. Several other industries are also reporting fall in activity and revenue forecasts where businesses are dependent either of travel or movement of goods to and from infected countries. The concern of the EU is that coordinated action by the United States and European countries should have been the preferred way instead of a unilateral ban. It could have been viewed in this light as well, as some of the losses of airline companies and other businesses belonging to both sides could have been minimized.

The current pandemic is an ironical situation in itself. Even with the massive advancement made by mankind in epidemiology to increase our understanding of viruses and other deadly pathogens, nature has been able to throw at us a puzzle such that, despite our massive technological advancements, we have still not been able to resolve. Currently, the best way to deal with the problem is prevention and containing it to as small a geographical location as possible. As past experiences with similar viruses suggest, good hygiene, protective measures and common sense are the most potent initiatives against the outbreak and could well be able to save millions of lives.