U.S. State Department Overhauls Travel Warning System
Photo Credit: The state department will issue new travel advisories for each country to describe various situations, such as this protest pictured in Istanbul, and how they might impact travel. Flickr / Eser Karadağ
Skift Take
It's a complicated world and the State Department is trying to make it a little less complicated for U.S. travelers wondering if it's safe to travel somewhere. There will likely be a learning curve to understand the new system and how other countries respond to them.
The U.S. Department of State is changing the way it makes recommendations to U.S. travelers about which destinations are unsafe to visit by eliminating travel warnings and alerts and issuing travel advisories, to various degrees, for every country in the world.
Starting this week, each country is ranked on the State Department's travel advisory website according to one of four levels: Level 1 (exercise normal precautions), Level 2 (exercise increased precaution), Level 3 (reconsider travel) and Level 4 (do not travel). The third and fourth levels effectively replace travel warnings that were previously issued for some countries such as Afghanistan and Somalia.
The changes represent one of the largest overhauls in the state department travel advisory system's history and the first significant change to the system in many years, said Michelle Bernier-Toth, acting deputy a
