International Air Transport Association (IATA, an airline lobby group) is stating that it does not support mandatory social distancing measures that would leave middle seats empty, but instead supports passengers and crew wearing facemasks. Their main evidence for this claim seems to be two flights that contained symptomatic passengers that lead to no onboard transmissions. They state keeping the middle seat open wouldn’t even meet social distancing guidelines as the average seat width is 50cm and most authorities recommend 1m-2m. IATA also wanted airlines to have the ability to deny refunds for flights that the airlines themselves cancel and instead offer vouchers.
I don’t think I have enough access to data to make an informed decision either way. My gut feel is that passenger loads are so low at the moment anyway it really doesn’t hurt airlines to keep that middle seat open. The other thing that airlines need to start worrying about is consumer confidence and reducing distancing between other passengers seems like an easy win in that department.
