On any given day, you can see evidence of just one more way that the H1N1 or so called Swine Flu has changed travel. Any agent who doesn’t wonder where it will stop is not very informed. While the answer to this question remains open and changes often, one thing is for certain: no one wants to go to a foreign country for corporate travel and be quarantined.
It is more than understandable that countries use quarantines to stop the spread, especially in places like China, where many of the people live in close quarters. However, H1N1 pops up in various places anyway. The May 11, 2009 issue of “Travel Weekly” printed an amusing sidebar about all the strange things people have done in response to the scare, especially the World Health Organization (WHO). They not only changed their definition of “pandemic” to me less definite (?), but even more peculiar one of their representatives suggested that there should be a contest to see if someone can come up with a “more user-friendly name” for the disease.
If you are expecting an answer here to the question of how your job as planner will change over the coming influenza months, you will be disappointed. However, it can be said with confidence that you will need to stay abreast of all H1N1 developments as well as keep yourself updated continuously on how foreign countries–as well as the U.S.–are handling incoming visitors. The last thing you want is to send a large group of people from a prominent company to a foreign country, only to have them cooped up until after their event is over.
Be informed and be successful.
