The United Kingdom is considering scrapping its red list and the travel bans it imposed over fears of the Omicron variant.
The government has said that all 11 countries will be removed from the UK’s travel red list from 4am on Wednesday.
Angola, Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe are on the list.
The red list was reintroduced in late November as a precaution after the emergence of the Omicron variant.
But Health Secretary Sajid Javid said it had spread so widely the rules no longer had much purpose.
“Now that there is community transmission of Omicron in the UK and Omicron has spread so widely across the world, the travel red list is now less effective in slowing the incursion of Omicron from abroad,” he told parliament.
“Whilst we will maintain our temporary testing measures for international travel we will be removing all 11 countries from the travel red list effective from 4am tomorrow morning.”
Daily Mail reports that Transport Secretary Grant Shapps convinced colleagues to replace it with testing for the fully vaccinated. The report mentioned that the move was expected to be approved as soon as this week.
The report followed a televised address made on Sunday by Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who raised concerns over the “emergency in our battle with the new variant, Omicron, and we must urgently reinforce our wall of vaccine protection to keep our friends and loved ones safe.”
Mr Johnson announced rolling out increased vaccinations, up to one million booster jabs per day to stem an incoming “tidal wave of Omicron” and avoid imposing further restrictions.
Last week, the UK placed Nigeria on its red list, adding a pre-departure COVID-19 test requirement for all in-bound travellers and arrivals from the country. The country further placed a temporary suspension on reviewing and issuing visitor visa applications from all red list countries, including Nigeria.
In addition to the new restrictions, travellers who had been in a red list country 10 days before arriving in the UK have been required to quarantine for 10 days in a quarantined hotel and take a COVID-19 test.
