As of midnight last night, all arrivals into UK from Spain will have to go into 14-day quarantine.
Strictly speaking self-isolation, not quarantine.
For once the UK government has acted promptly.
14-day self-isolation for arrivals from Spain, FCO advice, do not travel to Spain (Balearic Islands and Canary Islands exempt).
Spanish holiday in Tenerife during the summer. Thus what is safe today may not remain safe.
The usual suspects are bleating, airlines, tour companies. They knew Spain was high risk, but happily transported tourists to Spain.
Reckless behaviour by Jet 2 encouraging tourists to ignore FCO advice and travel to Spain regardless. Those stupid enough to ignore FCO advice will invalidate their travel insurance.
Nothing surprises me cowboy Ryanair.
Countries across Europe are acting responsibly, restricting where visitors are from, who can enter the country.
More countries could be added at short notice to the UK quarantine list.
We can take the train. It will reduce CO2 emissions, but does nothing to halt the spread of covid-19. When we travel, we risk spreading covid-19.
Everyone entering UK should be scanned for high temperature, random testing of arrivals.
Those who travelled to Spain, should have known it was risky. Did travel companies like tui and Jet2 not warn them? I doubt it.
Only a couple of weeks ago, travel companies flew a plane load of willing lackeys who would write glowing reports it is safe.
If we look at affected regions in Spain, the numbers of covid-19 cases had shot up in the last few days.
The Spanish Foreign Minister who claims coronavirus under control, she also claims no political show trials in Catalonia, demonstrates her stupidity every time she opens her mouth.
If we look at USA, fast approaching 100,000 case per day.
Beaches packed, nightclubs and bars heaving. Only now has Barcelona shut down nightclubs, affected tourist areas shut down bars. In US very late in the day shut down bars.
Why were they ever open?
We should all be learning lessons.
We do not heed the whining from the tourist sector. They are not victims as they like to portray themselves, they are the perpetrators.
In England, why are pubs open? Why is The Lion and Snake and other pubs full of drunks, fights in the street, not closed, licence withdrawn?
Leicester in lockdown, why no roadblocks?
Bolton and other cities seeing sharp rise in cases, why no local lockdown?
Unless streets are closed traffic free tables in the street we are going to lose many local indie coffee shops and restaurants.
We must rethink tourism. In Venice they are rethinking tourism. It is ridiculous flying to a location for one week to sit in a bar full of drunken yobs from UK. We must encourage longer stay, direct bookings, end stranglehold of tour companies on the sector, quality tourists, fewer tourists, implement a post-pandemic doughnut economics recovery programme.
Few places are safe to travel to. It is not only the risk of quarantine on return, it is the risk of being stranded, of falling sick. Does your travel insurance even cover covid-19?
And those places that have had few cases, where unlike UK they acted quickly, will see cases rise if they permit visitors from countries like UK where covid-19 is not under control.
Those returning from Spain, or had their package holiday cancelled, will very soon discover the cover tui was offering not worth the paper it was written on.
Cancelled flights, refunds within seven days. Cancelled package holidays, refunds within fourteen days. But good luck with that as many are still waiting a refund.
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