CDC: Vaccinated people can travel, but shouldn't

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday said fully vaccinated people can safely travel at "low risk" but urged Americans not to with COVID-19 cases once again on the rise.

Conway G.

Gittens has more.

"Fully vaccinated grandparents can fly to visit their healthy grandkids without getting a COVID-19 test..." New travel guidelines were issued by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Friday.

The relaxed guidance from the CDC says fully vaccinated people can travel domestically with "low risk" but must continue to wear a face covering and practice social distancing on planes, trains, buses and public transport.

In addition, there's no need to be tested before or after domestic travel and there's no longer a need to quarantine after a trip.

But.... while the CDC says it is medically safe for fully vaccinated Americans to travel starting two weeks after their final dose... CDC Director Rochelle Walensky explains, the recommendation comes with a major caveat.

"While we believe that fully vaccinated people can travel at low risk to themselves, CDC is not recommending travel at this time due to the rising number of cases.

We are at sixty four thousand new COVID cases today, and that is and our numbers continue to increase.

We had an increase of eight percent today.

I still continue to worry that with 80 percent of the population unvaccinated, that we have a lot of work to do to control this pandemic." The airline industry praised the change as a good first step.

Air travel is down 43% since the health crisis pretty much grounded flying to a halt.

But Americans appear to be warming up to getting back on a plane again.

Daily TSA screenings are at their highest since the health crisis began.

Friday's CDC guidance is different for overseas travelers.

There are still restrictions that bar most-non U.S. citizens from the United States who have recently been in China, Brazil, South Africa and most of Europe.

And the CDC is also keeping requirements that nearly all international travelers get a negative COVID-19 test before boarding a flight to the United States.... It recommends getting tested again a few days after returning to U.S. soil.

But there is one change, those fully-vaccinated no longer need to go into self-exile.