Israel begins new uni-lateral travel deals with Greece and Cyprus
Israel has been leading the world in its aggressive COVID vaccination plan. 4 million of its 9 million residents have already received the first of the two Pfizer-BioNTech shots within a few short months. The country is hoping to have everyone over the age of 16 vaccinated by the end of March. Israel’s vaccination campaign has been an impressive benchmark for the rest for the world to follow, but Israel is also leading the world in innovative bilateral tourism deals.
Israel has recently signed tourism deals with two of its Mediterranean neighbors, Greece and Cyprus. The deals allow vaccinated tourists of Greece and Cyprus to travel freely to Israel, and vice versa, without having to quarantine. The lack of a self-isolation period is massive and provides a glimmer of hope that a sense of normalcy is on the horizon.
The countries will be working together to reopen their economies to tourism as their vaccination efforts are underway and cases of COVID-19 continue to decline. President Nicos Anastasiades is also hoping to work with Israel’s Ichilov hospital on a new COVID-19 treatment and said that Cyprus would participate in clinical trials.
Israel is also said to be negotiating similar agreements with the United Kingdom, Estonia, Romania, Serbia, Georgia, and Seychelles. With historic peace deals made recently with the AUE, Bahrain, and Morocco in recent months, Israel could also look to negotiate similar tourism deals with these countries as well.
The deals are a rare win-win scenario for all parties involved. Tourists who have been patient in wanting to travel over the past year can now do so safely and without the need to self-isolate. Countries who have experienced economic hardships as a result of the pandemic can aid each other’s tourism industries by satisfying all this pent-up demand.
These bilateral tourism deals also highlight the confidence in the effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine despite the emergence of new global variants. Early data in Israel has shown the Pfizer vaccine to be over 95% effective after both doses and experts are cautiously optimistic about Israel’s vaccine progress. US infectious disease expert Dr. Fauci said, “Israel has a remarkable diminution of cases associated with the efficacy of their vaccine.” The effectiveness of the vaccine has allowed Israel to start easing lockdown restrictions for those who have been fully immunized.
The only concern that remains is how other countries can hope to keep pace with Israel in vaccinating their populations. Israel has been so far ahead of most countries that they may have to wait for others to catch up with their vaccine efforts. It seems that the only thing holding Israel’s complete return to normalcy back is the slow pace of other nations in administering the COVID-19 vaccine.
As Israel, Cyprus, and Greece begin to implement these tourism agreements, it is critical to develop solid communications and messaging that underscores the safety in this tourist circuit. In addition, closely monitoring tourist sentiment online through sentiment analysis tools will allow for all three tourism authorities to track tourist feedback at a local, regional or national level as well as to develop new visitor standards. At Trove, our strategic planning and online marketing & social media offerings provide solid footing for any evolving destination looking for help implementing new policy or strategy.
- For more news, contact the Trove Team