Australia is set to reopen its borders to fully vaccinated tourists from February 21, according to an announcement on Monday, February 7, by PM Scott Morrison.
This brings to a close some of the most draconian regulations of the pandemic, which left Australia isolated from the rest of the world for two years, since March 2020.
For a great deal of this time Australians were not permitted to leave the country and only tiny numbers of passengers were allowed to enter, with each city having its own quota from every country of application. These passengers needed to have special exemptions to enter, and were then subjected to a very strict, very expensive 14-day hotel quarantine.
Now, arrivals must take an antigen or PCR test before travel and still abide by the quarantine or isolation rules of the state of their destination – for example in New South Wales, self-isolation for seven days and a series of self-tests are required.
Morrison said the borders would reopen to all visa holders on February 21. "If you're double vaccinated, we look forward to welcoming you back to Australia,” he said. “I know the tourism industry will be looking forward to that."
He quoted the high-profile deportation of unvaccinated tennis star Novak Djokovic, and said that should have sent a very clear message to everyone around the world what the requirement was to enter Australia.
Australian Minister of Home Affairs, Karen Andrews has gone on record saying that unvaccinated travellers wishing to enter Australia would have to apply for exemption. "They will have to provide proof that there is a medical reason that they cannot be vaccinated."
Michi Messner, Qantas Regional Manager Africa, told Travel News that the opening of Australia for tourists on February 21 would herald an extremely exciting time for Qantas. She said there was now some hope that Qantas could restart flights to some more international destinations sooner than it had anticipated. “We also hope that the airline can add capacity to some existing services sooner than had been previously considered.”
Qantas currently has three flights a week between Johannesburg and Sydney and only accepts fully vaccinated passengers.
Although Australia’s international borders will be open, the state of Western Australia is showing no signs of opening, having remained sealed off from the rest of the country and the world for the duration of the pandemic. When the country announced a softening of its international border regulations earlier this year, see here, Western Australia (whose state capital is Perth, where a quarter of all South Africans in Australia live) said it would maintain a hard closed border indefinitely.
