5/9/2021 Covid-19 Vaccines in U.S.

Beckon Foreigners Seeking Shots and Shops - WSJ

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U.S.

Covid-19 Vaccines in U.S. Beckon Foreigners

Seeking Shots and Shops
Tourism from Texas to Florida gets a boost as tens of thousands from Mexico and elsewhere arrive for
jabs

By Elizabeth Findell and Juan Montes | Photographs by Verónica G.

Cárdenas for The Wall Street Journal
May 8, 2021 9 00 am ET

Listen to this article

8 minutes

McALLEN, Texas—Even before New York City announced plans to offer visitors free
vaccines, tourism from Texas to Florida has received a boost as tens of thousands from
Mexico and other countries fly to the U.S. for a shot in the arm.

“Enjoy Dallas, Includes Covid Vaccine,” said a Mexico travel agency ad. Thai tour
companies are selling vaccine packages to California. Northern states in the U.S. are
supplying their Canadian neighbors with doses.

Most of the travel appears to be between Mexico and Texas. Mexican airlines have added
routes to South Texas and stepped up frequency. Flights to Houston, Dallas and San
Antonio are booked for weeks, and prices are rising.

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Cindy Mijares of Monterrey, Mexico, received a dose of the Covid-19 vaccine at an Edinburg, Texas,
pharmacy this week.

Cindy Mijares, a 31-year-old jewelry designer from Monterrey, Mexico, said she booked a
Covid-19 vaccination appointment at a Texas pharmacy, as have many of her friends.
People hesitate to talk about crossing the border for a vaccine, concerned that they are
doing something wrong, she said, adding that she just wants life to go back to normal.

“I’m excited, I’m happy, I want to go travel,” she said.

Mexico has fully vaccinated 6% of its population, compared with 31% in the U.S., according
to figures from Our World in Data. Mexico is still mostly focusing on people over the age of
60, while the U.S. is providing the shots to those 16 or older.

In April, some 207,000 passengers departed for the U.S. from Mexico City’s international
airport, compared with 177,000 in March and 95,000 in February, according to
preliminary data from the airport. Top destinations in April were Houston and Dallas,
with 41,000 and 26,000 passengers, respectively, followed by Los Angeles, Miami and San
Antonio.

Patricia Ridruejo, 38, who was about to board a recent flight from Mexico City to Dallas
with her sister, said they didn’t want to wait for the vaccine any longer to spend time
safely with their 72-year-old mother. They had already booked flights for their second
doses.

“We want to end this nightmare once and for all,” Ms. Ridruejo said. “If we have the
money, why shouldn’t we do it?”

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Ads promote travel o ers including P izer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson shots.
PHOTO: GRUPO TRAVEL

Texas, like many U.S. states, doesn’t require residency for Covid-19 vaccines. Unlike in
Mexico, where there are too few vaccines to go around, some U.S. states are offering
incentives. New Jersey this week announced a “shot and a beer,” offering a free drink at a
participating brewery to adults who have received their first shots.

On Thursday, New York City began promoting itself as a travel spot for vaccine seekers.
Florida officials announced in April that they would rescind a residency requirement put
in place after an initial surge of vaccine tourism. In Alaska, Gov. Mike Dunleavy said
travelers could get free vaccines at the state’s major airports starting June 1, in an effort
to boost tourism.

While Texas state officials have said foreigners account for a tiny fraction of shots
administered, travelers often list a local address on forms.

Mexico’s travel agencies, battered by the pandemic, have been quick to spot an
opportunity. They sold U.S. tourist packages in March and April to 170,000 people, most of
them seeking the vaccine, said Eduardo Paniagua, the head of an industry association.
The U.S.-Mexican border is closed to nonessential ground traffic, but travelers can enter
by plane.

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Air travel by vaccine seekers to McAllen, Texas, provides bene its for the local economy.

The Mexican editor Eduardo Huerta, 56, wrote in his newspaper, El Economista, about
traveling to Texas to get a vaccine. He had heard it was easiest to find appointments in
smaller, rural towns, and he went to Corsicana, Texas, about 55 miles south of Dallas. His
hotel was full of Mexicans who were in the U.S. to receive shots, he said.

Mr. Huerta had a family friend who died of Covid-19, and a co-worker lost both of her
parents to the disease. Now, he said, many people he knows are heading north for
vaccines. One of them saw a Houston Astros game during the trip, while another rented
an Airbnb for three weeks for family members who were seeking two doses. Mr. Huerta
returned for his second dose Thursday.

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“I’m not embarrassed,” he said. “We come from a country where the vaccination process
is going very slowly, and is being managed inefficiently, and we don’t want to die.”

Mexico’s government has cited difficulties in gaining access to vaccines and alleged that
some developed countries have accumulated doses at the expense of developing nations.
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The trips to the U.S. have a knock-on effect on local economies. Vaccine-seekers buy
flights, stay at hotels and spend extra time shopping and eating out. They revive the
economies of places such as Texas’s Rio Grande Valley, where businesses reliant on cross-
border trade have been hurt by a year of the border being closed.

Mexican visitors to McAllen, Texas, typically made up $1 billion of the city’s annual
average of $3.5 billion in retail sales before the pandemic, said Steve Ahlenius, president
of the chamber of commerce. The local population has one of the lowest incomes in the
U.S., but the area is a top destination for wealthy Mexican shoppers.

Saul Sanchez, co-owner of Carats in McAllen, Texas, helps a customer try on jewelry. Carats’ business plunged
when the border closed and has been buoyed by the return of Mexican visitors.

At Carats, on McAllen’s main drag, Carlos Melguizo and Saul Sanchez wear jeweled cuff
links and offer glasses of Champagne to customers checking out the glittering rows of
diamond necklaces. Many of their customers are Mexicans, and business plunged when
the border closed. They tried to appeal to locals by increasing their inventory of
moderately priced gifts, with their top-selling item being a note pad with a cheeky
expletive.

Now the Mexican customers are coming back, resulting in the highest April sales in his 25
years at the store, Mr. Melguizo said. He doesn’t ask his customers what draws them, but
he notices the Band-Aids on their shoulders, he said.

“As a country, we’re helping Mexico get vaccinated, and that’s going to help us,” he said.

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One group particularly interested in vaccine travel has been Mexico’s private doctors,
who weren’t included in vaccination of health personnel working in public hospitals. Only
about a quarter of private doctors have been vaccinated, and those who can afford to do so
are making the trip, said Belinda Cázares, the head of Mexico’s federation of doctors
associations.

Other foreigners are getting U.S. vaccines through official channels. Mike Murphy, a 53-
year-old truck driver from Winnipeg, Manitoba, was one of hundreds of truckers from the
Canadian province to take advantage last month of a free cross-border vaccination
program by North Dakota. The state is offering doses to roughly 6,000 Canadian truckers
after Manitoba’s premier requested help.

Mr. Murphy, who drove his big rig to a state site about 30 miles south of the border, said
the shot put a bounce in his step.

In Browning, Mont., the Blackfeet Nation recently offered hundreds of surplus vaccines to
members of the Blackfoot Confederacy in Canada and residents of the town of Cardston,
Alberta, at a drive-through vaccination site near the border last month.

Alberto Cuellar, at the McAllen, Texas, airport, said he and his brother traveled from Mexico City to
get their second vaccine doses.

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In Thailand, a travel agent said her company had 200 people book vaccine tours to the U.S.
in the first day of taking reservations. Travelers pay the equivalent of about $2,400,
excluding airfare, to spend 10 days in California in a group of eight to 10 people, the agent
said. The itinerary includes a Johnson & Johnson shot, visits to San Francisco and Los
Angeles landmarks, beach visits and several days of shopping.

Asked during a news conference about Thai vaccine travel to the U.S., Opas
Karnkawinpong, director-general of the country’s Department of Disease Control, denied
it was occurring.

“How could they give free shots for other citizens when they can’t vaccinate every
American citizen?” Dr. Karnkawinpong asked.

—David Luhnow, Wilawan Watcharasakwet, Vipal Monga and Kim Mackrael contributed
to this article.

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Write to Elizabeth Findell at Elizabeth.Findell@wsj.com and Juan Montes at

juan.montes@wsj.com

Copyright © 2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved

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