by Lacey Pfalz
Last updated: 10:58 AM ET, Wed March 31, 2021
The Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) released the results of its second study on how visitors view Hawaii's Safe Travels program.
The survey asked visitors who traveled from the U.S. mainland to Hawaii between February 12 to February 28, 2021 about their trip and pre-testing satisfaction.
Eighty-two percent of visitors rated their trips as excellent. An overwhelming majority said that their trips either met or exceeded their expectations. Almost eighty percent would recommend traveling to Hawaii within the next six months.
Hawaii's Safe Travels program allows travelers to bypass the mandatory 10-day self-quarantine, provided they receive a negative COVID-19 NAAT test result within 72 hours prior to departure. The test must be administered from a Trusted Testing Partner, like Walgreens pharmacies.
The pre-travel testing experience improved for visitors since the first study, conducted in December: satisfaction grew from seventy-nine percent to eighty-five percent.
That doesn't mean it went smoothly for everyone, however. Of those who'd experienced difficulty with pre-testing, over half said the 72-hour window was too short. Almost thirty percent encountered problems finding a Trusted Testing Partner, while almost a quarter said the cost of the tests was too high.
Almost all of the respondents said they'd adhered to the required mask mandates, while the majority practiced social distancing and avoided gatherings.
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