Amid travel restrictions imposed by several countries for nations with “virus variants”, Germany expressed its plans of lifting the ban on travellers from India and 4 other countries. The decision was taken in view of the decreasing number of cases in these regions and will be effective from Wednesday.
The national disease control centre of Germany, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) announced 5 countries’ reclassification as “high-incidence areas” from “virus variant countries” on Monday. These include India, the UK, Russia, Nepal, and Portugal, which were hit with the Delta variant of coronavirus. The nation had started the grouping to stop the virus variants from spreading rapidly in the area.
Nevertheless, the delta variant was still becoming the dominant strain in Germany, its health minister Jens Spahn said, leaving no reason for the ban to continue.
This lift applies on travellers who aren’t German residents or citizens. However, the mandatory quarantine and testing rules stay.
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During Chancellor Angela Merkel’s visit to the UK last Friday, he hinted at Germany’s plan of easing the travel restrictions imposed on Britain. Last month, he had given his stance for tougher restrictions in the region, along with longer quarantine periods, for travellers coming from the UK.
However, she indicated that fully vaccinated people will be allowed to enter again without quarantine. “We think that in the foreseeable future, those who have received double jabs will… be able to travel again, without having to go into quarantine,” she said.
Fully vaccinated people can now avoid quarantine and proceed with their travel plans. 10-day quarantine period can be reduced to 5 if travellers present a negative covid test result after 5 days.
The listed countries as of now would be reviewed later as the delta variant cases rise. Though the daily new cases have become very less, more than half of them belong to the delta strain.
Zimbabwe, Botswana, Uruguay. Brazil, Eswatini, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, Zambia, South Africa and Malawi are the 11 countries currently on the list of “virus variant” nations.
Israel, Iran, Kuwait, Canada and several other countries have placed India under “red list”, banning all flights from India.
