Covid-19: UK scraps traffic-light system, eases travel restrictions; Indian diaspora to benefit

The brand new two-tiered system may stay in place until the year-end. (File)

The UK on Friday eased journey restrictions for folks arriving within the nation. The relaxations would assist vaccinated folks coming to and from England, and will notably profit Indians.

Site visitors gentle system scrapped
The UK will scrap the purple, inexperienced, and amber nations — the traffic-light system — primarily based on Covid-19 danger ranges from 4 October. It’ll solely retain the purple checklist that denotes Covid-19 hotspots.

The brand new two-tiered system may stay in place until the year-end, with additional evaluations deliberate early subsequent yr.

India, which was positioned within the amber checklist, will profit from the principles. It’ll cut back the price of travellers.

Nonetheless, India remains to be lacking from the UK’s expanded checklist of nations whose vaccines it recognises, that means Indians who had taken the Covishield jab would nonetheless require to bear a Covid-19 assessments earlier than departure and upon arrival within the UK.

Guests from 17 further nations travelling to the UK from October 4 would now not require to bear a pre-departure RT-PCR take a look at after the nation recognised their vaccines. These nations embrace together with Malaysia, Japan, Canada, South Korea, Australia, and Singapore.

From October-end, absolutely vaccinated passengers travelling to the UK from non-red checklist nations would have the ability to undertake the lateral circulation assessments, a less expensive different to the present day-two PCR take a look at.

The UK will even ease testing necessities for vaccinated travellers from open nations. Whereas the travellers will nonetheless must bear a take a look at upon arrival, they’ll go for the cheaper lateral circulation assessments as a substitute of the pricier PCR take a look at from October-end.

UK Transport Secretary Grant Shapps mentioned the modifications entailed a less complicated and simple system.

He added the UK’s worldwide journey coverage at all times had public well being on the coronary heart. With the nation vaccinating over 44 million folks, it may possibly now afford to introduce an up to date construction reflecting the brand new panorama, he mentioned.

The UK additionally eliminated Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Pakistan from the purple checklist alongside Turkey, Egypt, Kenya, Oman, and the Maldives.

UK well being Secretary Sajid Javid mentioned the nation had simplified the journey guidelines in order that these may very well be simply adopted, and opened up tourism.

With international vaccinations accelerating and extra folks getting safety from the virus, it’s proper that the nation’s guidelines maintain tempo, he added.