WASHINGTON: U.S. travel demand remains low even as tens of millions of Americans get vaccinated for COVID-19, with just 12per cent planning a spring break trip this year, the industry said on Thursday.
"We really can't recover until we get this pandemic under control," said U.S. Travel Association Chief Executive Roger Dow, who added that corporate travel departments were still advising employees not to travel. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is still discouraging Americans from any non-essential travel. The group urges the U.S. government to set a target date for seeking to resume international travel, which remains down nearly 80per cent.In early 2020, the U.S. travel industry employed 16.9 million people, which fell to 8.7 million in April 2020. It rebounded to 13 million jobs as of January, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.