CANBERRA, Australia — Qantas Airways has pushed back its forecast resumption of international travel to late December.

The Sydney-based airline previously said international travel would restart in late October, based on the government's forecast on vaccine availability for Australians. However, the Australian government forecast Tuesday that international travel will remain at low levels until mid-2022 and vaccines won’t be widely available in Australia until the end of 2021.

“We will keep reviewing these plans as we move towards December and circumstances evolve,” Qantas said in a statement Wednesday .

Australia bans its citizens from leaving the country except under limited circumstances to prevent them from bringing home infections.

The only exception is New Zealand. The two countries last month introduced a quarantine-free travel bubble that recognized their success in containing the virus.

Qantas said it was optimistic more travel bubbles would open once Australia completes a vaccine rollout and other countries are in similar positions.