Covid: Pre-departure travel tests to England to be scrapped

[webfact]

File photo for reference only

 

The rules on testing are to be eased for people travelling to England, the government has announced, following calls from the travel industry.

 

From 04:00 GMT on Friday, fully vaccinated travellers coming to England will no longer have to take a test before they travel.

 

And from Sunday, rather than taking a PCR test on day two of arrival, they can take a cheaper lateral flow.

The rules for self-isolating on arrival will also change.

 

The shake-up was confirmed by Boris Johnson earlier, following calls from travel firms who said the measures were not effective now that Omicron was spreading widely.

 

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/business-59876063

 

-- © Copyright BBC 2022-01-06

 

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[RandolphGB]

Finally some common sense. 
 

Next up - scrap all lockdowns,  masks, vaccine passports, quarantine and testing.

[RandiRona]

Smart move! With incubation time , it make little sense to test before. After arrival make sense.

[RandiRona]

22 minutes ago, RandolphGB said:

passports

Serious or Sarcasm OR Serious Sarcasm?

[RandolphGB]

36 minutes ago, RandiRona said:

Serious or Sarcasm OR Serious Sarcasm?

Vaccine passports 

[smedly]

airline may still insist on preflight tests - also a lot of flights do not fly directly to the UK 

 

Personally I would prefer passengers are tested before boarding a flight that I have to share with them

[hotchilli]

6 hours ago, RandiRona said:

Smart move! With incubation time , it make little sense to test before. After arrival make sense.

And what if after arrival is too late?

[JustAnotherHun]

3 minutes ago, hotchilli said:

And what if after arrival is too late?

What if before boarding is too early?

[hotchilli]

I was always taught early is better than late.

[ukrules]

Makes sense, so many people have covid that it really doesn't matter any more.

 

Thailand is not in this situation yet, but it will be and soon.

[superal]

One of the reasons for scrapping pre- flight tests maybe the availability of fake pcr test reports . Having said that fake vaccination certs with kosha QR codes are also being sold . So all of the paraphernalia of checking certs at airports could be a waste of time . Waiting times at Heathrow immigration , for arrivals to be cleared , can be up to 7 hours . Individual airlines may well take their own stance on this latest Boris announcement because they have to be seen taking health & safety into account for not only their passengers but their air crew who if catch the virus will be unable to work and flights would be cancelled , so not good for business . I do not fancy boarding a plane when there could well be infected passengers.  Maybe airports could carry out their own rapid tests ?

[Mac Mickmanus]

Flying from Thailand to the U.K and you need to take a PCR test because the U.K doesn't want the new Omicron virus to enter the U.K.

  The fact that Omericon is prevalent in the UK shows that all these tests are a waste of time and effort

[superal]

3 hours ago, Mac Mickmanus said:

Flying from Thailand to the U.K and you need to take a PCR test because the U.K doesn't want the new Omicron virus to enter the U.K.

  The fact that Omericon is prevalent in the UK shows that all these tests are a waste of time and effort

Cannot argue with that but I still do not want to catch the virus . Heads you win , tails you lose ?

[arithai12]

19 hours ago, smedly said:

airline may still insist on preflight tests - also a lot of flights do not fly directly to the UK 

 

Personally I would prefer passengers are tested before boarding a flight that I have to share with them

The article is not correct. The quoted BBC link is more clear. Unvaccinated people are still required to take pre-departure tests, as well as full PCR tests on arrival.