Now France and Holland are put on quarantine list
Hundreds of thousands of British travellers faced a stampede to get home from France after it was added to the uK quarantine list last night.
The decision came after days of steeply rising numbers of infections among the French population.
The quarantine is set to come in at 4am tomorrow – and with an estimated 500,000 British holidaymakers in France, a weekend of chaos looms.
The netherlands and Malta are also being added to the quarantine list, Whitehall sources confirmed.
Boris Johnson has vowed to be ‘absolutely ruthless’ in imposing the fresh curbs. The French health ministry yesterday reported 2,669 new infections in 24 hours – a post-lockdown record. The total is almost double the number two days earlier.
All returning travellers from France, the netherlands and Malta will have to self-isolate for 14 days.
They face a fine of £1,000 if they breach quarantine.
Channel Tunnel and Brittany Ferries said ‘extremely limited capacity’ could leave many stuck in France and there are fears children will miss the start of school term on september 1 if they are still there beyond next Tuesday.
But the Prime Minister yesterday warned: ‘We have got to be absolutely ruthless about this, even with our closest and dearest friends and partners. I think everybody understands that.
‘We can’t be remotely complacent about our own situation. In a pandemic you don’t allow our population to be reinfected or the disease to come back in.’
Infection rates in France have rapidly increased since mid-July, when it was added to the list of ‘safe’ countries.
The 14-day rolling average of new cases yesterday hit 32 per 100,000 people, compared with 18.5 in the uK, while Paris has seen even higher rates of 60 per 100,000.
The netherlands is on 40 nationally and Malta 75.
French politicians have blamed the rise on carelessness among youngsters, an influx of holidaymakers and people moving from cities to holiday homes. The curbs will heap fresh misery on crisis-hit airlines and tour operators and signal a death knell for foreign holidays this summer.
The new rules will put huge pressure on cross-Channel operators as they struggle to deal with a rush of families coming home over a 30-hour period.
John Keefe of Getlink, the Channel Tunnel firm, said: ‘We have laid on four trains per hour, which is the most we can run, but these services are already extremely busy.’ Brittany Ferries warned that sailings are operating at 40 per cent capacity due to social distancing and P&O Ferries capacities are also reduced.
The daily Mail understands some travel bosses have been preparing for the worst-case scenario for some days now.
Airline chiefs are said to be annoyed by inaction on airport testing – viewed as an acceptable alternative to blanket quarantine rules. Curbs on spain, Belgium, Andorra and the Bahamas began earlier this month following a rise in cases.
Last night, First Minister nicola sturgeon posted a message on social media to say that due to increased Covid-19 concern, the scottish Government will remove the same countries from the quarantine-exempt list.
Miss sturgeon added: ‘As of 4am saturday, you will need to quarantine for 14 days if you arrive in scotland from these countries.’