Hawaii governor says he's 'looking at a delay' of program that would allow tourists to visit without quarantining

You might need to bid “aloha” to your Hawaiian vacation plans. (And no, not “aloha” in a good way.)

Hawaii Gov. David Ige said Thursday that state officials are “looking at” possibly delaying a program that would allow transpacific travelers to visit the island without immediately quarantining for 14 days.

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The program, which would have allowed visitors to bypass a mandatory 14-day quarantine by presenting the results of a negative COVID-19 screening, was originally slated to begin on Aug. 1, but was already delayed until at least Sept. 1, per a July press release from the Department of Transportation.

“We will be looking at a delay of a transpacific pre-travel testing program,” the Democratic governor said at a Thursday press conference. “I know that going backwards will cause further harm to our economy, but we have always said that the health and safety of our community will be the highest priority.”

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In response to a later question from the press, Ige said he further believed it would be “very difficult” to start the program by Sept. 1.

“As we have said from the very beginning, health care capacity and the capacity in our hospitals is one fundamental metric that we are monitoring. So we want to see the number of cases drop which would then reduce the stress on the hospital facilities. With the case count increasing the way it has, it would be very difficult to implement and start the pre-travel testing program on Sept. 1.”

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The same day that Ige held his press conference, Hawaii recorded 355 new cases of COVID-19 infection in a single day — a record high, with further cases still under investigation.