State: U.S. Repatriates 1000s More Americans ‘Trapped’ Overseas amid Coronavirus

The U.S. State Department has helped thousands of additional Americans “trapped” overseas amid the ongoing novel coronavirus pandemic to return home in recent days as part an unprecedented effort, bringing the total number of repatriations to nearly 64,000.

As of Thursday afternoon, State had “coordinated the repatriation of 63,812 Americans on 589 flights from 106 countries since January 29,” statistics on the department’s website that are updated regularly revealed.

State officials have described the ongoing efforts by the Repatriation Task Force at State Department as “unprecedented.”

Peru (6,833), Honduras (6,428), India (5,110), Guatemala (4, 154), and El Salvador (4,069) accounted for the top five most significant concentrations of stranded Americans repatriated by the State Department as of Thursday.

Referring to the ongoing efforts by the department’s repatriation task force, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared on Tuesday:

So it’s been a big task. We have now rescued over 61,000 American citizens who were trapped all across the world. You know some of them, I’m sure, who were either on vacation or a mission trip or … overseas for work, whatever it may be, and all of a sudden the world stopped moving. Planes stopped flying; trains stopped running, buses. They raised their hand; they came to the State Department and said, “Can you give us an assist?” And we moved into action.

The State Department continues to stress that its message to Americans overseas is for them to “decide whether they seek our assistance in returning now, or to be prepared to ride out some indefinite stay where they are,” U.S. officials reiterated on Thursday.

Dozens of State officials have also contracted the coronavirus illness (COVID-19) inside the United States and overseas.

Domestically, there were 72 coronavirus cases and two deaths involving State officials as of Thursday, the department’s data showed.

Of the 75,000 State officials in over 220 locations around the globe, 187 have caught the virus, and three have perished.

U.S. officials have said that the Trump administration is using military aircraft, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) deportation planes, and chartered flights to get some Americans home while asking others to avail themselves of commercial means to return whenever possible.

In some cases, the State Department “is offering repatriation loans for U.S. citizens who request assistance to help pay for the flight tickets,” Hugo Yon, the deputy assistant secretary for transportation affairs at State’s Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs, told reporters on Thursday.

Ian Brownlee, the principal deputy assistant secretary for State’s Bureau of Consular Affairs, added that the repatriation loan program had been around for decades.

“Essentially, what it says is, if we’ve got a U.S. citizen who is overseas and destitute, unable to pay their way home again, we may lend them the money to buy that ticket,” he explained on Thursday. “And as I say, this is a program of longstanding, used many, many times a year around the world.”

“In these circumstances, with a near-complete shutdown of international air travel and the stranding of so many people, we are processing more [repatriation] loans than we previously did,” he noted.