COVID-19: UK plans to scrap quarantine for non-vaccinated foreign arrivals

Britain plans to scrap quarantine for fully-vaccinated arrivals from other countries in the coming weeks, Transport Minister Grant Shapps said on July 9. While the coronavirus cases are still witnessing a steep rise across the country, Shapps on Thursday, waived off self-isolation for Britons returning from mid-risk countries. Subsequently, on Friday, he expressed a desire to open up for travelers arriving from “other locations in the world”. 

'Actively working on it' 

Speaking to Sky News, the transport minister reckoned that Downing Street wanted to be able to open up the country for people adding that they were “ actively working on it”. Furthermore, he said that he would be able to come forward and say “more about other locations in the world” in the “next couple of weeks”. According to the latest tally by worldometers, the UK has registered a total of 5,022,893 cases of coronavirus, out of whom 128,336 have lost their lives while 4,348,864 have recovered. 

Shapps said the process of recognizing vaccination status would focus on countries administering WHO-approved vaccines, and said the process was complex because each country has different certification systems. Speaking at a discrete interview with BBC later, Shapps said that the UK’s system was easier from the EU because of the “digital passport” they have. However, he said that it was more complex for other countries like the US as they do not have a digitalized system. 

This comes as more than a hundred scientists and doctors, including Indian-origin professionals, signed a letter on Thursday 8, warning the UK government against a "dangerous and unethical" experiment of eliminating all legal lockdown limitations on July 19. Dr. Chaand Nagpaul, Council Chair for the British Medical Association (BMA), Dr. Deepti Gurdasani from the Queen Mary University of London, Dr. Bharat Pankhania from the University of Exeter, and Professor Sunil Raina from the RP Government Medical College at Tanda in India is among the 122 signatories of the letter published in The Lancet medical journal.

Image: AP