(TAN): While a negative Covid-19 test is mandatory for passengers travelling by air in most of the countries, some tourists are reportedly obtaining fake test results to get around the entry requirements, reported Ctvnews.
This practice puts other passengers at risk of contracting the virus despite travel restrictions being in place, authorities in different countries have warned.
Since obtaining a negative PCR test report may be difficult in time for departure, some travellers are buying false test results at the airport or from travel agents. As countries are gradually reopening borders with tough restrictions, such instances have popped up in several places around the world.
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In September, a group of seven people were arrested at Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport for selling fake digital certificates of negative coronavirus test results for USD 80 to USD 360 each, according to the Associated Press. The incident was uncovered following an investigation sparked by a traveller leaving France for Ethiopia who was carrying a fake digital certificate of negative Covid test.
Last month, the authorities of Fernando de Noronha island in Brazil reported that a group of travellers have been jailed for presenting fake negative test results in an attempt to enter the island on a private jet. The island required entrants to provide negative Covid-19 test results no older than 24 hours.
In yet another case, a UK man was quoted by The Lancashire Telegraph as saying that he had doctored the results of a friend’s test in order to travel to Pakistan. The newspaper also spoke to another traveller who was offered a fake document by their travel agent.
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“You can simply get their negative test and change the name and birth date to your own. You also put a test date on which is within the time limit required,” the unnamed man explained in an interview with the newspaper.
However, as test-result protocols for travel become stricter amid second and third waves across the world, authorities say it is unlikely that many tourists will be able to travel with manipulated documents.
Hawaii, for example, no longer accepts paper copies of reports. Instead, it requires visitors to preregister in their online testing program using an approved testing partner, and upload Covid-19 test results to a digital portal.
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