COVID wake-up call
My wife and I recently traveled to Europe for a month and spent time in Italy, France and Switzerland.
Going and coming, we had to show COVID vaccine and test documents at each transit point, in order to get boarding passes for the flights or board an overnight ferry.
This was the case until our return to Hawaii.
When we arrived at the airport to return home, I had all COVID documents in hand and approached the Hawaiian Airline ticketing agent, expecting to have to show the documents before getting the boarding passes — but no!
The agent instructed me to go to the kiosk, enter my confirmation code, and print the passes.
I asked why I did not have to show any COVID documents, and was told that everything would be verified after we landed in Honolulu.
I also asked what would happen if I did not have the proper results upon landing, and was told that we would be “returned to the mainland.” Really? At whose expense?
And what about two people traveling in fully loaded airplanes, potentially exposing everyone onboard to the virus (mask policy was very loosely enforced on the flight)? And then exposing all again on the “return to mainland” flight?
This seems incredibly irresponsible, but is it the fault of the airline, or a glaring loophole in Hawaii’s COVID containment protocols?
Sadly, Hawaii’s attempt to keep this pandemic at bay is obviously failing (look at recent numbers!), and this travel experience was a real wake-up call to those failings.
I realize that we desperately need the tourists (and their money) to return, but are we spreading aloha, or COVID?
Terry Weber
Mountain View
More incentives
It was sad to read in the Tribune-Herald that our hospital (Hilo Medical Center) is once again full because of COVID-19 (Tribune-Herald, Aug. 10). Honestly, this brought a tear to my eye.
Hawaii people are generally pono, at least compared to other places. But yet so, so many people are still not vaccinated.
Initially, I was opposed to the idea of offering incentives (bribes?) for vaccinations, but clearly this is now the best tool we have. Our state should spend whatever is necessary to get this large group of selfish, unvaccinated people to do the right thing.
These people don’t care about the rest of us, but maybe they’ll care about “cashing in.”
I realize this rewards bad behavior, but I’ll get over it if the end result is they get their shot(s), and we can put this misery behind us.
A. Yamamoto
Hilo