More countries tighten travel curbs to quell Omicron

Air travellers to the United States will face tougher Covid-19 testing rules, while more countries tightened their borders amid uncertainty around the virulence of the Omicron variant and its ability to evade vaccine protection.

Japan and Hong Kong said they would expand travel curbs and Malaysia temporarily banned travellers from countries deemed at risk.

Japan, which had already barred all new foreign entrants, reported its second case of the new variant yesterday.

Other countries braced for more cases: Australia said at least two people visited several locations in Sydney while likely infectious and Denmark said an infected person had taken part in a large concert.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said “blanket travel bans will not prevent the international spread, and they place a heavy burden on lives and livelihoods”, while advising those unwell, at risk or above 60 years and unvaccinated to postpone travel.

Global health officials reiterated calls for people to get vaccinated.

“Our best form of defence still remains our vaccines,” British Health Secretary Sajid Javid told Sky News.

“It’s possible of course, it’s possible that it might be less effective. We just don’t know for sure yet. But it’s also very likely that it will remain effective against serious disease.”

European Medicines Agency executive director Emer Cooke earlier said that laboratory analyses should indicate over the next couple of weeks whether the blood of vaccinated people has sufficient antibodies to neutralise the new variant.

BioNTech’s CEO said the vaccine it makes in a partnership with Pfizer would likely offer strong protection against severe disease from Omicron.

Britain and the United States have both expanded their booster programmes in response to the new variant.

Omicron has spread to more than a dozen countries, with Nigeria among the latest to report cases of the variant.

Saudi Arabia confirmed its first case coming from a north African country.

Some 56 countries were reportedly implementing travel measures to guard against Omicron as of Nov 28, the WHO said.

WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he is concerned that several member states were “introducing blunt, blanket measures”, which “will only worsen inequities”.

The United States is moving to require that all air travellers entering the country show a negative Covid-19 test performed within one day of departure, the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said.

Japan said it would expand its entry ban to foreigners with resident status from 10 African countries.

Hong Kong will expand its entry ban for non-residents to three more countries, Japan, Portugal and Sweden, from Friday. – Reuters