London, January 6, 2021
The UK has imposed a fresh lockdown in view of the discovery of the new strain of the highly infectious Coronavirus. Prime Minister, Boris Johnson while addressing a Press Conference at Downing Street on Tuesday spoke of stricter measures being adopted to prevent admitting the virus again through travelers.
With a new stricter lockdown in place in the UK and a surge in new infections, PM Johnson has spoken of stricter measures to curb the spread. As per the new directives being contemplated, travelers coming into the UK may need to have a negative coronavirus test report. This point is being considered by the Ministers and awaiting their concurrence. As per this new rule, all International arrivals will need to provide a negative PCR test which should have been conducted 72 hours prior to their departure. This rule would apply to all travelers and all modes of transport. This would include, air, ferry and train, UK Nationals and all who live in the UK will not have to undergo this.
While no formal announcement of this was made as yet, Michael Gove made references to this during interviews that were broadcast on Tuesday. If this plan is implemented, The UK will join many other countries that too have the same in place. The rule during the earlier lockdown was limited to 10 days of isolation for arrivals into England from certain countries.
When the lockdown had been introduced for the first time it was argued by the government that with the high rate of infections this measure would not prove to be very helpful. In June, however, a quarantine period was introduced.
Boris Johnson had mentioned that the current lockdown would be harsher in many ways.
