Asuncion’s Silvio Pettirossi International Airport will have its own laboratory to perform COVID-19 testing, and the results will be ready in one hour.
“The installation of a laboratory in coordination with Public Health is well advanced. It is also a PCR swab system that will have its result in one hour. In such a way that we can facilitate passengers to come about three hours before check-in, take the test and have the result to travel», said Douglas Cubilla, director of the National Civil Aeronautics Directorate (DINAC), told the Asuncion newspaper La Nación.
The laboratory will be installed in the vehicle parking lot, and will be available to both passengers and the general public.
Although at the moment the Paraguayan capital only has regular operations with Montevideo (in the so-called «bubble» flights) and those of a humanitarian nature, in statements made this Wednesday to the radio Universo 970 AM, the Minister of Foreign Relations stated that » Resumption of commercial flights with Brazil will be before October, 30th, ”while negotiations are also being held with Chile and Spain.
The JURCAIP, the chamber that groups the international airlines that operate in Paraguay, requested today the reopening of the airport to regular flights.
“Historically, Paraguay has had the lowest level of air connectivity in all of Latin America. Therefore, delaying the reopening of scheduled air services not only affects the sustainability of the entire chain of the aeronautical and tourism sectors, but will also produce consequences that could isolate it even more geographically. Unless there is a substantial change in the public policies adopted, the decline in the supply of air services will be superlative. Regarding the volume of air traffic, we will return to levels of 15 years ago. The remedy will be much worse than the disease, » they said through a statement reproduced on Aeronauticapy.com.