“Just one more month.” That’s what everyone says, and it has been Hawaii’s de facto strategy for dealing with the coronavirus. If Hawaii clamps down for just one more month, the virus may be brought under control and restrictions eased. This was the hope in June, and July, and now August. Perhaps just one more month, and Hawaii can open in October.
Given that five months of quarantine have ended in an uncontrolled virus outbreak on Oahu, the time has arrived to ask whether a strategy based on short term hope has run its course. The coronavirus may very possibly remain a problem not only through September, but a year or two more. We are moving out of the short term and into the medium term. Rather than trying to beat the virus outright, Hawaii should consider approaches to reviving the economy under the assumption that the virus will remain an endemic problem indefinitely.
This may sound dire, but in fact, Hawaii is far better prepared to pull through than many may appreciate. To an extent, Hawaii will have to reinvent itself – as so many of us will in this dislocated era – but the adjustment is within the state’s capabilities.
As a Mainlander now two weeks post quarantine, I would like to offer my experience as a model for a new strategy from the visitor’s perspective.
The incoming tourist faces not only quarantine, but more dauntingly, the flight over. Back on the East Coast, we have established daily routines to protect us from the coronavirus, including face masks, social distancing and limiting interpersonal interactions outside the household. Most of us have confidence that we are relatively safe on a daily basis. We cannot, however, control the ten-hour flight to Hawaii, in an enclosed space filled with strangers – exactly the conditions the experts tell us to avoid. If Hawaii wants more visitors, reducing the actual and perceived risk of flying is a critical part of the equation.
When I flew from New York last month, until I landed at Kona, no one checked my temperature, required any kind of test, or asked me anything about my health beyond a few superficial questions. Incredibly, one can still fly around the US without anyone taking in any serious interest in whether one is contagious or not. I would have paid double for my ticket if I had confidence that everyone on my flights had passed a coronavirus test. Even if Hawaii does not lift the quarantine, requiring test results not more than a week old would go a long way to creating the confidence to fly. This would not necessarily address all the problems in multiple-stop flights, but it would at least cover the leg of the trip from the west coast to Hawaii.
In addition, the importance of new, less sophisticated virus tests cannot be overstated. These tests are cheap and quick, but they measure infectiousness rather than the illness. That is, they measure whether the test taker has a virus in an infectious state, not necessarily whether they have covid or not. For purposes of a flight, this would be a huge step forward. From the traveler’s perspective, the question is not whether someone potentially sick is on board, but rather whether they will transmit the disease to you during the flight. Rapid tests which filter out those in an infectious phase of the virus would enormously boost the confidence needed to fly to Hawaii.
Second, Hawaii should manage perceptions by preparing a regular dashboard of quarantine results. Because Hawaii – and only Hawaii – has had a blanket quarantine in place now for almost five months, it has data unique in the entire United States. Indeed, when you arrive at the airport in Hawaii, you are compelled to provide your cell number, which they call right on the spot to confirm that it is yours. In my case, quarantine control followed up twice, at the end of the first and second week. The State of Hawaii knows that I was symptom-free at the end of quarantine. This data can be used to determine the risk of flying. When I flew to Hawaii, I did not know whether my odds of contracting covid were 1 in 5, or 1 in 5000. I still don’t. If state government would share quarantine results on a regular basis, that would help potential visitors decide whether the flight is worth the risk. The state cannot promise to reduce the risk to incoming passengers to zero. But those same visitors cannot reduce their risk to zero at home, either. In the end, it comes down to taking reasonable, timely and cost-effective steps to reduce risk and helping potential visitors make informed choices at a time when all risk cannot be eliminated.
Rather than trying placing all bets on eliminating the virus completely, Hawaii should consider approaches to reviving the economy based on the assumption that covid will remain endemic indefinitely. Success will come from learning how to manage virus transmission risk while allowing the economy to function. For Hawaii, it is not a matter of victory, but of adaptation.