As India faces the worst brunt of the pandemic, lockdowns are returning and international travel restrictions are appearing. While United will maintain three India routes, it will suspend one and delay the start of another.
United Airlines Suspends, Delays India Service
During the pandemic, United Airlines has maintained service to India; the only U.S. carrier to do so. That includes the following service:
- Newark (EWR) – Delhi (DEL)
- Newark (EWR) – Mumbai (BOM)
- San Francisco (SFO) – Delhi (DEL)
Recently, United launched Chicago – Delhi service and also planned to launch San Francisco – Bangalore later this month.
But with India reporting 400,000 new cases per day (which experts believe is a vast undercount), domestic and international restrictions are being introduced. Many countries, including the United States, have banned non-US citizens who have been in India within the last 14 days to enter the United States. Other nations have added restrictions as well.
Within India, new lockdown measures have been introduced. For example, states including Tamil Nadu and Karnataka will move to lockdown next week. Another national lockdown is also being discussed.
Adjusting to demand, United Airlines will suspend Chicago (ORD) – Delhi (DEL) service in June and delay the launch of its San Francisco – Bangalore flight from May 27th to August 1st.
In an internal memo, United told employees:
To date, we’ve flown more than 300,000 pounds of medical supplies to India and will match customer donations to our relief partners like the GlobalGiving Foundation and World Central Kitchen. We are also flying larger Boeing 777-330ER aircraft on seven roundtrip flights between ORD and DEL to accelerate relief efforts.
At the same time, we continue to monitor customer demand and are adjusting the start date of our planned service between SFO and BLR (Bangalore, India) from May 27 to August 1, as well as temporarily pausing service between ORD and DEL (New Delhi, India) during the month of June.
The three remaining routes are also being closely monitored.
CONCLUSION
With new travel restrictions and a potential national lockdown, it hardly surprising that United is pausing some India service. If case numbers do not improve, I would expect remaining flights to shift to cargo sectors and passenger service to be further limited.
Is there any scientific correlation with lockdown and reduction in cases or deaths?
I’ve seen about 25 peer reviewed papers by now that show none.
Why are we still doing this nonsense?
Does anyone use science anymore? Or just political power games?
Lockdowns, unless done in the early stages of an elimination strategy, are ineffective. They do not work as part of a suppression strategy as followed by so many Western countries. SARS-CoV-2 was hardly an existential threat to humanity. Fat folx pay the price for not taking care of their bodies. Old folx should have been shielded. The rest of us should have gone on with our lives. Safetyism is destroying the West. President Xi is surely laughing at the Westerners tearing their countries apart over this nonsense and too afraid of being called racists/xenophobes/conspiracy theorists to investigate the true origins of the virus.
@George, very difficult because lockdowns are not all the same. Some have lots of exceptions. Others have populations that ignore lockdowns or partially ignore them to varying extents.
Singapore, Taiwan, and Australia have had lockdowns and few cases. On the other hand, Italy had lockdowns and lots of deaths.
Countries with lots of deaths have not had strict lockdowns. Lots of deaths have occurred in the US, India, Brazil, Mexico, and the UK. #5 UK has had lockdowns. As far as deaths per million population, the US is about 18th highest, not 1 or 2.
@cargocult, brain fog is noted in about 1 in 5 of Covid sufferers so even if you don’t die, you may live in fog. Not good.
It’s fake news to say that only 1% die and young people do ok with Covid.
Which explains why people below with 40 of healthy weight and no cormorbidities are dying in India. Please stop spreading your bunkum dear cultist
@derek
Brain fog or worse is noted in five out of five folx who support authoritarianism. COVID-19 can be mitigated without mass lockdowns. Note that there is no negative correlation between stringency of lockdowns and deaths per capita.
@747always
India has a much younger population than Western countries. There are proportionately fewer old folx to die. The proportion of COVID-19 deaths would be expected to skew younger in India. India has a much worse health infrastructure than is found in developed countries and so people who might otherwise have lived with Western-standard care are dying. Even so, death rates are far, far lower than in the West. Why does do we need to coerce people to keep them alive? Anyone who is choosing to go out during a pandemic is making a cost-benefit calculation that the risk is worth it. How can you shame or blame someone else for engaging in a behavior you are engaging in as well?
Hey George – can you link to some of those 25 peer reviewed papers that say this? Would love to read them.