UK scraps quarantine rule for 60 countries, except US
BRITAIN IS SCRAPPING A 14-DAY ISOLATION FOR ARRIVALS FROM COUNTRIES DEEMED ‘LOWER RISK’
Starting July 10, visitors from Australia, Japan, France, Spain, Germany and Italy will not have to self-isolate
Boris Johnson wants a haircut and a drink. Like millions of other Britons, the prime minister will be able to have a trim and a tipple today, when the country takes its biggest step yet out of lockdown with the reopening in England of restaurants, pubs and hairdressers, along with secular and sacred venues including cinemas and churches.
Britain is also opening up to travel, announcing yesterday that it will scrap a requirement for people arriving from dozens of countries to spend 14 days in isolation. Starting July 10, quarantine will be lifted for arrivals from about 60 countries deemed “lower risk” for the coronavirus, including France, Spain, Germany and Italy — but not the United States, the world’s worst-hit country from Covid-19.
For isolation-weary Britons and cash-starved businesses, relief at easing the three-month lockdown is mixed with trepidation. Britain has the highest Covid-19 toll in Europe, with almost 44,000 confirmed deaths, and scientists say the coronavirus is still on the loose. The Office for National Statistics estimates there are 25,000 new infections a week in England. Even the usually ebullient Johnson said this week that the virus was “still circling like a shark in the water.”
“My message is for people to enjoy summer sensibly and make sure it all works,” Johnson told LBC radio on Friday. “Let’s not blow it.”
When pubs and restaurants reopen Saturday, it will be anything but business as usual.
They will have to take contact details for each group, and people can only socialise with one other household at a time. There will be more cleaning, a ban on queuing at the bar for a drink, and reduced capacity, with patrons told to stay at least one meter (three feet) apart.
Different vibe
“I think the vast majority of pubs and restaurants are welcoming and opening with enthusiasm,” said Jane Pendlebury, chief executive of Hospa, the Hospitality Professionals Association. “Still, the restrictions are making it tough.
“And of course, the pub environment, the restaurant environment is going to have a very different vibe,” she said.
“In those public areas we’re used to quite often being shoulder to shoulder, almost to having to rustle up (a) space at the bar. That’s going to be so very different now.”
Some pubs are staying closed over the weekend, or even longer. Even so, police have questioned the wisdom of reopening pubs on a Saturday. Tim Clarke of the Metropolitan Police Federation warned the weekend could be “as busy as policing New Year’s Eve.”
Brian Booth, chairman of the police officers’ body the West Yorkshire Police Federation, said that before lockdown, local emergency rooms “on Friday and Saturday nights were at times akin to a circus full of drunken clowns. We do not need this once again.”
One city in England will not be joining in the reopening. Leicester, population 300,000, was sent back into lockdown this week amid a spike in coronavirus infections. Non-essential shops have been closed and pubs and restaurants won’t be reopening today.
They are also staying shut north of the border in Scotland.
Johnson’s Conservative government is increasingly at odds on virus-fighting strategy with Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon. Scotland controls its own health policy, and Sturgeon has been more cautious about lifting lockdown than authorities in England. Pubs in Scotland can open beer gardens from Monday, but won’t be able to serve people indoors until July 15.
My message is for people to enjoy summer sensibly and make sure it all works. Let’s not blow it.”
Boris Johnson | UK Prime Minister