You are here

Article Text

Article menu

Download PDFPDF

XML
Commentary
COVID-19 travel restrictions and the International Health Regulations (2005)
  1. Barbara von Tigerstrom1,
  2. Kumanan Wilson2,3
  1. 1 College of Law, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada
  2. 2 Bruyère Research Institute, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
  3. 3 Clinical Epidemiology Program, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
  1. Correspondence to Dr Barbara von Tigerstrom; barbara.vontigerstrom{at}usask.ca

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2020-002629

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    Summary box

    • Concerns that have been raised about states violating the International Health Regulations (2005) by imposing travel restrictions are valid, and some states have not complied with their obligations under those Regulations.

    • Given the unprecedented situation and uncertainty about the best course of action, we should not assume that all travel restrictions violate international law, even though they were not recommended by the WHO.

    • Some travel restrictions are more likely to be justified than others, depending on a number of factors, including how they are designed and local capacity to implement less restrictive measures.

    • The WHO still has an important role to play in providing guidance to states as they modify or lift travel restrictions.

    • In order for the international framework to be more effective, the WHO should have more flexibility to make early travel recommendations and develop protocols to facilitate the reopening of borders.

    Introduction

    From the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been concerns that states are violating their obligations under the International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR (2005))1 by imposing restrictions on international travel.2 3 These concerns are justified, but in this unprecedented situation, there are few clear answers. What is evident from the unfolding of events is that either the WHO’s guidance on travel was wrong and had a serious negative impact on the spread of disease, or states’ actions to prevent the spread of disease through travel restrictions have unnecessarily had a serious negative impact on the global economy. We expect the answer is somewhere in between, but it appears that the IHR (2005) framework to prevent unnecessary interference with international travel and trade is not succeeding as intended.

    Timeline of COVID-19 and travel-related decisions

    After reports of a novel coronavirus emerged in January, the WHO advised the usual precautions for travellers and consistently recommended against any travel or …

    View Full Text