New Year causes wave of passengers with Covid on planes

Last Monday (3), friends Flávia and Bruna put on the mask, “stuffed themselves” with gel alcohol and held back not to touch anything during the two and a half hours of flight between Salvador and São Paulo. The cheese bread was swallowed under the 3M in a corner of the airport.

The day before, the test had been positive, indicating the presence of the new coronavirus, and the trip that was supposed to last 13 days was shortened to 9. By this time, the 26-year-old entrepreneurs from São Paulo, vaccinated with two doses, were already with cough, body ache and 37°C fever.

“We didn’t know what to do. Talk to mother, doctor, grandmother, research, come back, never come back, in a tiny inn, in the ‘noia’ of infecting other people. Each one said something, it was chaos”, says Flávia — the names of all interviewees were changed at their request.

They weren’t the only ones. New Year’s Eve caused a wave of passengers with symptoms and positive tests for Covid-19 traveling by plane to quarantine at home, without money to extend their accommodation or afraid of getting sick in an unknown or unstructured place.

The country is experiencing a rise in cases after the holiday season, driven by the ômicron variant. Among Brazilian airlines, Azul confirmed that it had noticed an increase in contamination among employees, while Gol and Latam did not respond.

Companies say they are following protocols to prevent transmission. Azul highlights distancing measures at check-in, boarding and disembarkation, and Latam says that passengers with Covid can reschedule their trip without a fine, just paying the fare difference.

The country does not require exams or proof of vaccination for domestic flights, only for international flights. Those coming from another country must do the antigen test up to 24 hours before boarding or the PCR up to 72 hours before.

Experts point out that the risk of getting infected on aircraft is very low compared to other closed places, because they have a system that renews the air every few minutes. The most recommended, however, is that the traveler fulfills the ten days of isolation before flying.

In the case of Flávia and Bruna, the low risk and the discomfort of being sick away from home weighed on the decision to return to São Paulo. Including them, 5 of the 9 young people who spent the New Year together at Moreré beach, on the island of Boipeba (BA), tested positive during or after the trip.

For designer Gabriel, 30, his pocket was the determining factor in keeping the ticket from Rio de Janeiro to Florianópolis, where he lives. The mild sore throat he felt in the New Year’s Eve hangover evolved into weakness, dizziness and fever last Monday, when he tested positive.

“My boyfriend, who is a doctor and lives in Rio, said that it was not a good idea to come back like this, even so he could take care of me, but his family is staying in his room and he couldn’t get a place to stay. $500 a night when I looked,” he says, his voice still husky.

According to infectious disease specialist Eduardo Medeiros, a professor at Unifesp, it is also important to consider whether the city where the patient is located has structure in case of aggravation of the disease. “If it’s a capital, a place with resources, stay there. Now, if you’re going to a place without any assistance, it’s wise to go home,” he says.

The carioca couple Bianca and Rodrigo, 32, has not yet made up his mind. The two engineers have been isolated for four days in a hotel room on the beach of Barra Grande, in Cajueiro da Praia (PI), a city of 7,700 inhabitants 480 km from the capital Teresina and where there is not even testing for Covid.

Both began to feel the symptoms during the New Year with 14 friends in the village of Atins, in Lençóis Maranhenses. All returned on the 2nd to Rio de Janeiro, where six of them tested positive for Covid.

“Our ticket is scheduled for Friday [7], but we still don’t know what to do. When the staff tested positive, we even considered advancing it, because here it is far from any hospital. I didn’t even sleep well, I was nervous, worried. But we decided to stay”, says Bianca.

The difficulty of knowing the exact day of the onset of symptoms, with the consequences of several days of partying and drinking at the end of the year, is also one of the obstacles reported by young people to make the decision to travel. “It’s a mixture. You take medicine to enjoy the trip and mask the signs”, she says.

The couple’s routine has been countless movies, as well as meals delivered to the door and made on the bedroom balcony. The maid came in once to clean while they were outside wearing a mask, but they chose not to notify the hotel as they did not have the test confirmation.

It’s the second year that Covid spoils Bianca’s New Year’s Eve, even though she now has the three doses of the vaccine. The turn of 2021 had to be canceled after she got infected over Christmas. “It’s frustrating because we planned everything. It’s the first time we’ve traveled together and we’re not enjoying it,” she says, with a headache.