SFO is Ramping Up COVID Testing for International Travelers in the Hunt for Omicron
Dec. 1—San Francisco International Airport is expanding testing of incoming international travelers in an effort to detect the new omicron variant of the coronavirus — the first case of which was found in a San Francisco resident who returned from South Africa on Nov. 22.
SFO is one of four U.S. airports — along with Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International, John F. Kennedy International and Newark Liberty International — expanding testing of passengers as part of an existing Centers for Disease Control and Prevention pilot program that began in October. The CDC picked those four airports because they are among the busiest in the U.S. for international travel.
The airports on Sunday began testing passengers from South Africa, Germany, France and the United Kingdom, countries where the omicron variant has been found. Previously, the focus had been on travelers coming from India, where the delta variant was first detected.
About 770 people arrive at SFO from Germany each day, 690 from the U.K. and 360 from France, according to SFO spokesperson Doug Yakel. These figures are for people whose last point of contact before SFO was in those respective countries, though they could have originated from elsewhere.
South Africa is harder to measure because there are no nonstop flights from there to SFO. But before the pandemic, about seven to eight people each day arrived from South Africa through other airports, Yakel said.
The testing is voluntary. Passengers can take a PCR test at the airport that will be "pooled" — meaning tests from many people will be processed at the same time, and if a positive is detected in the "pool," the samples will undergo genomic sequencing to see if the new variant is present. Or passengers can take home a PCR test and test themselves three to five days after arriving at SFO, which is in line with the CDC's recommendation that travelers take a test three to five days after international travel.
It was not immediately clear how many people have been tested, at all four airports or at SFO specifically, since the program began. Yakel said the airport does not have this data. The CDC did not provide details Wednesday on how many people have been tested. But Ginkgo Bioworks, one of two companies that provide the testing and lab processing for the program, said "thousands of participants" have been tested so far.
UCSF scientists are also screening the airport's wastewater for signs of omicron.
Arriving international passengers have already taken a pre-departure COVID test. Under CDC rules, travelers arriving from abroad who are 2 years of age or older must test before departure, regardless of vaccination status. Fully vaccinated passengers must show proof of a negative test that was taken three days or less before the flight. Unvaccinated passengers must show proof of a negative test that was taken one day or less before the flight.
Catherine Ho is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @Cat_Ho
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