Chile’s Latam Airlines has filed for bankruptcy protection in the US after travel restrictions all but emptied the skies in the region, sending air carriers scrambling for ways to cushion the coronavirus impact. Latam and several affiliates sought chapter 11 protection on Monday to reduce the size of its fleet, cut down its more than $7b in debt and cope with the pandemic’s severe impact on the aviation industry. The company, in which Delta has a big stake, said it secured $900m in bankruptcy financing from other shareholders, including Qatar Airways, to stay afloat during the restructuring process. “As we have adapted to new realities in the past, we are confident that Latam will be able to succeed in the post-Covid-19 context and continue to serve Latin America, connecting the region with the world,” said Ignacio Cueto, chairman of Latam’s board of directors. Latam said it was in discussions with governments in several countries within its service area regarding potential rescue lending or other economic assistance. Latam’s bankruptcy comes after it sold a $1.9b stake in December to Delta under a commercial joint venture designed to combine the routes of the two airlines between North and South America, according to court papers.<br/>
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Hong Kong-based genetics testing company Prenetics is in talks with government officials and airlines, including Cathay Pacific, to help make travel safer and rev up economic activity. The firm is turning to the airline industry to help figure out how to prevent second waves of infection stemming from imported cases of the novel coronavirus. “Testing, testing, testing will be critical for travel to resume,” said Danny Yeung, 41, co-founder and chief executive of Prenetics. “It’s scary, no one wants to fly,” he said. The company is the largest private laboratory in Hong Kong, in terms of testing capacity, with a maximum of 5,580 tests on a daily basis. It has more than 150 employees. Weaving together shared protocols could allow the free movement of people within “travel bubbles”. For Hong Kong, a travel bubble would do away with the 14-day quarantine on arrival in the city for travellers from within its limits. A Cathay Pacific spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for information about the airline’s plans to roll-out testing for Covid-19 among crew and passengers.<br/>