UK To Ease English Covid Travel Curbs As Infections Hit All-Time High
NDTV
"Now Omicron is so prevalent, these measures are having limited impact on the growth in cases, while continuing to pose significant costs on our travel industry," Boris Johnson said.
The UK government announced changes Wednesday to Covid travel rules for England, scrapping the need for visitors to have pre-departure tests and quarantine on arrival until they have tested negative.
The new arrangements under which arrivals will be able to take a lateral flow in the first two days after travel rather than a more expensive PCR test come as official data showed one in 15 people in England were infected with coronavirus in the last week of 2021.
The UK, already among the worst hit countries in Europe by the pandemic with virus deaths of nearly 150,000, has seen a fresh surge in cases due to the arrival of the Omicron variant in late November.
Updating lawmakers after daily case numbers crossed the 200,000 threshold in recent days, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said travel curbs beefed up last month to contain the strain were now ineffective.
