DfT, Global Travel Taskforce Prepare A Framework to Help Resume International Travel
Proceeding ahead with the predefined targets for immunization in the United Kingdom and the planned easements, the Department for Transport (DfT) has started working closely with the Global Travel Taskforce with an objective to restart the international travel in the third stage of reopening, scheduled for 17 May 2021.
As a part of stage two of planned easements, several activities, including outdoor attractions, hairdressers, indoor leisure, outdoor hospitality, local holidays, have been resumed from April 12.
Going ahead, the government intends to restart certain other activities including large events, fans at football stadiums, and international travel. Other than this, the authorities will be increasing the upper ceiling on the number of people who can attend a wedding or funeral alongside lifting the social contact rules.
The Global Task Force has been working to institute a framework that can develop a case to safely resume international travel. Under the framework set out by the Global Task Force, the administration will be launching a new traffic light system, travel certification, and green watchlist.
Traffic light system
The traffic light system will be incorporated within the international travel protocols that will help in categorising the countries based on the risk and restrictions required for international travel. This will further assist in gauging the vaccine roll-out in the countries from where the international travellers are arriving. Following this, the healthcare administration will remain vigilant to vaccinate the possible cases of Covid-19 variants.
The assessment will be based on the rate of infection, the percentage of population that have been vaccinated in respective countries and the prevalence of Covid-19 variants of concern. The country’s access to reliable scientific data and genomic sequencing will also be monitored.
As per the report produced by the Global Travel Taskforce, international travel is expected to restart from the third stage of reopening, under which the travellers will not be required to present the travel form or dictate a valid reason to leave the country. In order to restart better, the transport department has been working comprehensively to make sure that the international can be resumed in an affordable and accessible manner.
As far as the variants of Covid-19 (SARS CoV-2) are concerned, the restrictions related to infected people will remain in place as the risks posed by these variants remain significant. A 10-day managed quarantine, stringent testing services and certain other precautionary
measures will continue for the inbound passengers. However, the applicability of such protocols will be based on the destination visited and the source country.
Supervising arrivals
The monitoring of passengers will be done according to the Green, Amber and Red mechanisms. Pre-departure, as well as a PCR test will be mandated for the passengers arriving from the Green countries. Travellers can do the tests on the day of the arrival or they can do it two days before their scheduled arrival in England.
Individuals with negative test results will not be subject to any quarantine or isolation, but the people returning positive in their PCR tests will be mandatorily required for a stipulated quarantine.
Arrivals from Amber countries will be mandated to take a pre-departure and a PCR test on the second day and eight day, followed by a quarantine for a duration of 10 days. There will be an option for release on the fifth day of isolation upon a negative test result.
Arrivals from the Red nations will be strictly subject to all the restrictions that are already in place for the red list countries. Under this, all the passengers inbound from red countries will have to do a managed quarantine for a 10-day period in the hotel followed by pre-departure and PCR testing on the second and eighth day.
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