YES, it appears that the only light and end of this dreadful Covid tunnel is the vaccine, but a mounting number of countries around the world, in particular in Europe, are already having problems with obtaining desired amounts and administration - not to mention questions about its effectiveness.
At the end of last year at an international tourism summit in Palma, the chairman of one of the UK’s leading tour operators and airlines raised his concerns about a rapid roll out of the vaccine which could lead to the hasty opening up of air corridors and therefore holidays. Obviously, it is in his interest that the travel industry returns to some kind of normality as soon as possible. But safety has to be paramount.
It can take years to discover how effective a new vaccine is and what side effects it may have. As he warned “in five years time, we could all go blind.” A sobering thought but it raises the question of are we trying to run before we can walk with the vaccines.
What is certainly counterproductive is politicians starting to set deadlines by which time a certain percentage of populations will be vaccinated.
All they are doing are raising people’s hopes and falsely.
And, until we are all on a level playing field, I am afraid I can’t see travel taking off in the near future, otherwise we run the risk of being back where we started.