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Extra tests for arrivals in UK

Posted by (Northamptonshire, England) on

The UK is now making it 3 or 4 covid tests before being released from quarantine for all (except the very few usual exceptions) arrivals in the UK.

A PCR (all of the tests are PCR) negative three days before travel, then

A PCR negative 2 days after arrival (either at the airport hotel or home depending on where travel originates), then

A PCR negative 8 days after arrival,

then released from quarantine 10 days after arrival if all are negative.

A fourth test, a PCR negative, on the 5th day after arrival can shorten the quarantine when come back negative, but the 8 day test is still needed.

All these tests have to be paid for by the traveller, even for British residents and citizens. The BBC said this morning that that will run in the region of £500 per passenger for the 4 tests.

Fines of up to £10,000.00 and jailing for up to 10 years for breaking those travel laws.

Posted by
6113 posts

Arrivals from any red zone country will have to foot the hotel quarantine bill of £1,750 pp. The trouble is the red zone country list can quickly change.

It should have happened long ago, but will scupper any U.K. travel plans in the foreseeable future.

Posted by
58 posts

For us UK locals, I presume it is going to make prices for British holidays go up and people are going to book quickly!

Posted by
1358 posts

I think HM Gov missed “And stay out!” from their official statement! They’ve done all they can to dissuade anybody coming here for the foreseeable future, without actually banning or forbidding it. And of course those of us living here, not only are we locked down, we are effectively locked in.

Posted by
8027 posts

So the system is in place, but I wonder how many people, UK citizens or foreign visitors, are actually arriving right now, experiencing the quarantining and testing requirements? Are medical testers rotating to quarantine hotels at a particular time each day, to administer that day’s tests, or is there a resident tester at each hotel, staying in a designated room, or set up in a testing office that has been created for that purpose?

Unless it’s a UK citizen living abroad who absolutely needed to return home for some reason, who would choose to undergo all this, in addition to climbing aboard a long international flight in the first place? I hope the procedures are going to be effective in stemming infections, and that this all results in safely retuning travel possibilities to/thru the UK in the next few months.

Posted by
12019 posts

The only action that might be a more blunt "Keep Out", would have been to roll a rock across the opening to the Channel Tunnel and parking aircraft on the runways of all the airports.

Was this wording included in the enabling legislation?

we shall fight on the seas and oceans,
we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be,
we shall fight on the beaches,
we shall fight on the landing grounds,
we shall fight in the fields and in the streets,
we shall fight in the hills;
we shall never surrender,

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