Government should consider shorter quarantine and testing for returning travellers

The timing and speed of the process was extraordinary. Holidaymakers were given just a paltry six hours’ notice of the change, meaning those returning to the UK on Sunday, who fully expected to return to work as usual on Monday, were instead forced to begin a two-week quarantine. Thousands of others arriving back in the UK this week from Spain face a similar lockdown.

You can understand why the Spanish authorities are so frustrated. British holidaymakers in Spain say the country is taking more stringent precautions than the UK and the overwhelming majority appear to feel very safe there.

The blanket quarantine takes no account of the regional nature of Spain’s outbreaks. There is little evidence of a surge in many parts of the Spanish mainland traditionally visited by UK holidaymakers, while the inclusion of both the Canary Islands (2,000 kilometres from an apparent outbreak in Barcelona),and the Balearics is puzzling. Both sets of islands continue to experience far fewer cases than swathes of the United Kingdom. It is notable that Germany, which was far more successful than the UK in suppressing the coronavirus, has only advised its tourists against visiting parts of Spain which are experiencing a surge.

If the UK government wants the travel industry to survive surely it has to consider other measures that allow people to go on holiday while also ensuring that they don’t bring Covid-19 back into the country.

Reports that the government would consider a quarantine reduction to 10 days are encouraging. Surely it would also make sense to test all of those returning from overseas. This could be done as people arrived back in the country or even following a week of quarantine at home, after which people could resume normal life if they tested negative.