I have family and friends in the US. A lot of friends. I've visited on average 2 or 3 times a year over the last 20 years or so. (Almost all "tourist" travel, maybe 10 or so "business trips" for conferences or vendor meetings, all of which had ect4ended time as a tourist visit included).
I have accepted the fact that I'm unlikely to see my family or friends there for probably at least 3 maybe 5 years.
They will very unlikely be allowed to visit here (Australia), and if they are will probably need to spend 14 days in quarantine upon arrival. Right now I am not allowed to leave the country (without a special exemption, which sure as hell does not get granted "to visit my little sister and her family!")
Even if I got that exemption, I'd need to join the huge queue of people attempting to return to Australia with severely limited inbound international travel capacity (we were only allowing 4,000 returning citizens per week, with the current concern overt he UK strain that's been cut to 2,000 per week). There are news reports of people who've been trying and failing to get back to Australia for 6 months or more, with flights being cancelled - and confirmed tickets of flights being cancelled (reportedly for people with higher priced tickets to fly instead...)
I hope the vaccines work out. I fear that they may not - either being less effective that advertised, being less effective against mutated strains, or being thwarted by anti vaxxers.
I have accepted the fact that I'm unlikely to see my family or friends there for probably at least 3 maybe 5 years.
They will very unlikely be allowed to visit here (Australia), and if they are will probably need to spend 14 days in quarantine upon arrival. Right now I am not allowed to leave the country (without a special exemption, which sure as hell does not get granted "to visit my little sister and her family!")
Even if I got that exemption, I'd need to join the huge queue of people attempting to return to Australia with severely limited inbound international travel capacity (we were only allowing 4,000 returning citizens per week, with the current concern overt he UK strain that's been cut to 2,000 per week). There are news reports of people who've been trying and failing to get back to Australia for 6 months or more, with flights being cancelled - and confirmed tickets of flights being cancelled (reportedly for people with higher priced tickets to fly instead...)
I hope the vaccines work out. I fear that they may not - either being less effective that advertised, being less effective against mutated strains, or being thwarted by anti vaxxers.