:quality(75)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/elcomercio/7CKQ3CPGABGRFLLC7B4J6HYUFQ.jpg "Tourists can now enter the US: What are the vaccinations and tests required of foreign travelers?")
This Monday tourists have re-entered USA after 20 months.
And it is that this November 8, the restrictions imposed in March 2020 by then-President Donald Trump at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic have ended.
As of this Monday, those who are not U.S. citizens or permanent residents, must be fully vaccinated at least two weeks prior to traveling to the U.S. and must submit a negative test of covid-19 made a maximum of 72 hours before the trip. Both PCR and antigen will be accepted.
This rule does not apply to minors under 18 years of age, who must present a negative test carried out no more than 3 days before the trip if they are with a vaccinated adult or 24 hours before if the companion is not immunized.
Citizens or residents should not present proof of vaccination, but in that case the negative test must have been obtained only one day before the trip.
In some cases, foreigners who are not vaccinated will be allowed to enter, including those with certain medical contraindications or those who are not tourists and come from about 50 countries with vaccination rates below 10%.
According to the White House, acceptable proof of vaccination must match the name and date of birth provided to the airlines, be issued by an official source, and detail the vaccine administered, the number of doses received, as well as the date and location of the administration.
These rules will particularly benefit citizens of the European Union, United Kingdom, China, Brazil, India, Iran and South Africa, who they could not travel directly to the US for more than a year.
They were obliged to make a 14-day stopover in a third country.
Approved vaccines
A person is fully vaccinated within two weeks since they received their second dose (or the first, if it is a single dose), according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) .
The vaccines that will be accepted for entry into the U.S. are:
- Janssen / J & J
- Pfizer-BioNTech
- Modern
- AstraZeneca
- Sinovac (CoronaVac)
- Sinopharm
- Covishield
- Covaxin
However, millions of people in the world have received vaccines that are not endorsed by either the US or the WHO, such as the Russian one Sputnik or china Cansino.
In Latin America, Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Paraguay and Venezuela have applied Sputnik vaccines to millions. Cansino has also been administered in Mexico and Argentina.
Given this, the PAHO deputy director considered a few days ago that it is “discriminatory” to apply policies like this.
“That can certainly create a kind of discrimination with citizens for two rights, one to be able to get vaccinated, and the other for the vaccine they have taken, ”said Barbosa.
“But in any case, it is a sovereign decision made by each country and it is important that countries can reach bilateral or multilateral agreements so that all the vaccines that are being used can be accepted,” he added.
WHO recently reported that in the case of the Russian-made Sputnik V vaccine, its approval process could be completed by the end of 2021.
The delay in lifting the restrictions had generated controversy, as passengers from 150 other countries, many of them with high contagion rates, they could continue to enter the US without problem.