The European Commission has set out new plans to prevent the internal border closures of last spring, including a dark red label for areas where Covid is circulating at extreme levels.
In a press release on 25th January, the European Commission said that it had proposed an update to the agreed colour coding for mapping out high-risk areas, as well as stricter measures applying to travellers coming from these high-risk zones. There is also a strong recommendation to avoid travel at all whenever possible.
“The agreement in October on an EU coordinated approach for travel restrictions was a big step forward in our efforts to curb the spread of Covid-19 while preserving essential travel and the functioning of the Single Market,” said Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders. “The common map and a common approach to proportionate, non-discriminatory restrictions must still guide our efforts. What we need now in view of the new variants is even more coordination and a joint European effort to discourage non-essential travel. Border closures will not help, common measures will.”
Colour coding will essentially be the same as before with zones being marked as green, orange, red and grey, but now they will add a dark red to indicate areas where the virus is circulating at extreme levels. This would apply in places where the two-week notification rate is over 500 per 100,000 people. The European Centre for Disease Prevention will publish updated maps regularly.
For people travelling from dark red zones, EU member states are being asked to require them to undergo Covid testing pre-arrival and to self-isolate as recommended by the Health Security Committee of the EC.
Monaco’s incidence rate remains “very high” with 400 positive cases per 100,000 people over a seven-day period, the government announced on 26th January as it moved to extend by three weeks the current restrictions.
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