Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Hols are up in the air..
» Ministersays trips abroad are ‘very much’ out » But Ryanair boss confident on Europe visits
NORTHERN Ireland’s Health Minister Robin Swann has warned that foreign holidays are “very much” out this summer.
Mr Swann also expressed concern about the potential of a further surge in cases in the region and the consequences that would have across the region’s under-pressure health system.
The Health Minister said administrations across the UK and Ireland were having discussions about drawing up a red list related to foreign countries posing the highest Covid risks.
Asked at his weekly coronavirus media briefing at Stormont whether foreign travel was out in regard to summer holidays, the minister said: “I would say very much so.”
Mr Swann noted the steps being taken in England to fine people taking unnecessary overseas trips but he said similar action was not being considered by the Stormont Executive.
“It’s not a direction of travel that we would be going on at this point in time in the Executive,” he said.
There are currently no direct international flights in and out of Northern Ireland.
Mr Swann said an Executive task force continued to draw up plans for hotel quarantining arrangements for international travellers in the future.
The minister also suggested the Executive might have to restrict cross-border travel on the island of Ireland as Northern Ireland emerges from lockdown, given the slower rate of vaccination in the Irish Republic.
He said the disparity in rates would not affect his advice to ministerial colleagues on how fast society opened up north of the border, but he added: “What it may influence is advice and guidance that we may give on interjurisdictional interactions as to how that could be potentially looked at in the future as well.
“Because what we don’t want to see is the risk of further Covid outbreaks or, indeed, different variants
even entering Northern Ireland once we progress with our vaccine programme at the rate we are currently doing.”
However, the boss of Ryanair says he is “reasonably confident” families will be allowed on beach holidays to Europe this summer as the budget airline announced new routes.
Michael O’leary predicted Britain’s successful vaccination programme would prove the green light for breaks abroad to resume at last. He said: “We think there is a lot of pent-up demand for summer holiday travel.”
Mr O’leary criticised what he called “hysteria” around the threat to summer breaks in Europe. He added: “We expect the doing away with travel restrictions.”
His comment came despite advise from ministers earlier this week not to book holidays this summer amid a third wave in coronavirus infections in Europe. Mr O’leary also dismissed that those views, saying: “I don’t frankly pay too much attention to it.”
At the briefing, the region’s chief medical officer Dr Michael Mcbride was asked whether officials were concerned about early data suggesting the Astrazeneca jab might not be as effective against the South African variant of Covid.
Dr Mcbride said medical experts constantly monitored the safety and efficacy of vaccines.
“In terms of how effective the vaccines are and whether some of these variants escape from the vaccines, what we do know at this point in time is that the vaccines that we are using may not provide full protection, but even with those variants that are in circulation should provide protection from severe disease and death,” he said.
There were no further deaths of patients who previously tested positive for Covid-19 announced in Northern Ireland on Wednesday. Another 139 confirmed cases of the virus were recorded by the Department of Health.