As many of us return to flying as the world slowly recovers from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Etihad Airways just gave us a reason to feel a little bit safer.
The UAE’s national airline, based out of Abu Dhabi, just became the first airline in the world with all its operating pilots and cabin crew vaccinated to help curb the spread of the virus, reports the UAE’s state news agency WAM.
Etihad says they were able to accomplish the feat through an employee vaccination initiative they call “Protected Together”, launched in January. It builds off of the country’s Choose to Vaccinate campaign, which encourages all its residents to vaccinate as soon as possible against the virus.
“We proactively made the vaccine available to all our employees to not only help combat the effects of COVID-19 but to make travellers feel confident and reassured the next time they fly with us. We are the only airline in the world to make COVID-19 testing mandatory for every passenger and crew member before every flight and now, we’re the first airline in the world with 100 percent vaccinated crew on board,” said Tony Douglas, Group Chief Executive Officer of Etihad Aviation Group.
Last month, Etihad was awarded Diamond status for ensuring the highest standards of cleanliness and sanitisation in the inaugural ‘APEX Health Safety, powered by SimpliFlying’ audit.
“Following the national vaccination programme, we worked tirelessly to become an approved COVID-19 vaccination clinic to support our staff, and their dependants, be able to easily access the vaccine. Since December 2020, we have been offering in-house vaccination appointments to our employees and their loved ones to ensure we are focused on our employee’s wellbeing,” Dr. Nadia Bastaki, Vice President Medical Services and CSR, Etihad Aviation Group, said.
The UAE Government’s has a target of vaccinating half of the UAE population by the end of March 2021. According to WAM, Etihad is ahead of schedule with over 75 percent of its entire workforce already having received at least one dose of the vaccine. According to Etihad, this figure will continue to grow as more employees step forward and choose to vaccinate.
