Buttigieg Is Considering Implementing a Negative COVID-19 Test Requirement To Fly

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg is considering implementing a Negative COVID-19 Test Requirement to fly on commercial airlines.

The Hill: Buttigieg said that officials are considering a requirement that passengers provide a negative COVID-19 test ahead of domestic flights, according to an interview published on Sunday. One of President Biden‘s first confirmed Cabinet members told Axios on HBO that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is engaged in “an active conversation” on whether to implement the requirement. “What I can tell you is it’s going to be guided by data, by science, by medicine and by the input of the people who are actually gonna have to carry this out,” he said. “But here’s the thing: The safer we can make air travel in terms of perception as well as reality, the more people are gonna be ready to get back in the air.”

Buttigieg’s comments on a potential testing madnate comes after the CDC instituted a requirement for travelers on international flights to the U.S. to test negative for the virus that has infected more than 27 million and killed more than 464,000 in the U.S. alone, according to Johns Hopkins University data.