Dubai: Pakistanis in the UAE say they have put off plans to travel back home as the UAE government called on residents to avoid unnecessary travel in order to contain the novel coronavirus.
On Thursday, the UAE’s Ministry of Health and Prevention (MoHAP) asked its citizens and residents to avoid travel and said all those returning from abroad could undergo medical checks at the airport and home quarantine until given clearance.
For Hina Ahmed, a homemaker in Dubai, safety comes first. “We are not even thinking of traveling [to Pakistan] because of the situation,” she said.
Six cases of Covid-19 have been confirmed in Pakistan to date and though the country is not on the World Health Organization’s (WHO) list of high-risk countries, the warning from the UAE comes for travel in general.
On Saturday, the UAE confirmed 15 new coronavirus cases, bringing the total affected people in the country to 45, seven of whom have recovered from the disease.
“Even though Pakistan is not a high risk country, we can’t be sure of what will happen next so we have canceled our plans, said Nazia Mir, a Dubai-based banker. “We had plans to travel for holidays during this spring break,” she added.
Likewise, Ali Raza, a Dubai-based businessman said it was too risky to travel.
“Almost everything has shut down and the health authorities are issuing regular warnings, so it must be something serious. We have postponed our plans to visit Lahore until the summer,” he said.
But at least one airline operating on routes between the UAE and Pakistan sais there is only a negligible drop in passenger travel.
“We operate 46 flights from the UAE to different cities in Pakistan weekly and that hasn’t changed,” Abbas Raza Dar, Senior Manager UAE for AirBlue, told Arab News. He conceded there had been some drop in family travel.
Emirates Airlines refused to comment on country specific numbers.
Sami Ullah, an undergrad student from Pakistan at the American University in Sharjah said: “We have been given a month off and will be studying remotely. The UAE government has been very open about the situation and has asked everyone to avoid travel. I am following that advice.”
