Alaska to offer free vaccines at airports in a bid to boost summer tourism

The state of Alaska is to offer free Covid vaccinations to anyone landing at its airports from June, its governor has announced.

The move is a bid to boost tourism, with the generous offer of a free Pfizer or Moderna vaccine “another good reason to come to the state of Alaska in the summer”, governor Mike Dunleavy told a press conference.

“If you come to Alaska, you get a free vaccination if you want one,” he added.

The vast state took the lead in vaccinating its tiny population earlier this year and now nearly 40 per cent of those over the age of 16 are fully vaccinated and 47 per cent have received one dose of either the Moderna or Pfizer vaccine.

Snowmobiles, boats and planes were deployed to enable vaccination teams to overcome sparse settlements, vast distances and forbidding weather.

The successful campaign enabled the state to become the first to open up vaccine eligibility to anyone 16 or older living or working in the state last month. At the time of the announcement, Alaska had the highest vaccination rate in the country.

Both international and domestic visitors will be eligible for vaccination at four airports - Anchorage, Juneau, Ketchikan and Fairbank - with a five-day trial beginning at the end of this month at Anchorage International Airport.

Visitors will also be able to receive their second dose in the state, depending how long they stay. The US has stuck to vaccine manufacturers’ original dosing regimes rather than following the UK's approach of delaying doses to ensure as many people as possible receive their first dose.

Pfizer recommends that people receive their second dose 21 days after the first, while for the Moderna vaccine the delay between doses is 28 days.

Some 21 other states offer vaccines to non residents but Alaska is the first to link it so blatantly to a bid to boost tourism.

However, some experts have criticised the growing vaccine tourism movement in the US.

“It’s hard for me to believe that we’ve so maldistributed a vaccine as to make this necessary,” Dr Larry Brilliant, an epidemiologist who was part of the effort to eradicate smallpox in the 1970s, told the New York Times.

“You don’t want to exchange a bad carbon footprint for a vaccination. The vaccine should go where it will do the most good,” he added.

“Given the scarcity of vaccine in the world, every dose should be given in a way that is most effective at stopping this pandemic.”

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