British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced on Wednesday that compulsory Covid-19 tests required by overseas travellers no earlier than 48 hours before arriving in England will be scrapped from Friday morning.
Addressing the year’s first Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) in the House of Commons, Boris said the government is also lifting the requirement for international travellers, including those flying from India, to self-isolate on arrival in England until receiving a negative PCR test result. Instead, people can take a cheaper lateral flow test on day two of their entry into the UK.
“When the omicron variant was first identified, we rightly introduced travel restrictions to slow its arrival in our country; but now omicron is so prevalent, these measures are having limited impact on the growth in cases, while continuing to pose significant costs on our travel industry,” Boris said in his Covid-19 update to Parliament.
“So I can announce that in England from 4am on Friday we will be scrapping the pre-departure test, which discourages many from travelling for fear of being trapped overseas and incurring significant extra expense,” he said.
“We will also be lifting the requirement to self-isolate on arrival until receipt of a negative PCR, returning instead to the system we had in October last year, where those arriving in England will need to take a lateral flow test no later than the end of Day 2 and, if positive, a further PCR test to help us identify any new variants at the border,” he added.
It came as the UK continues to record very high daily infections — with another 194,747 Covid cases on Wednesday, down from Tuesday’s 218,724 cases.
Boris highlighted in his statement that as many as 90 per cent of those in intensive care with Covid have not had their booster vaccine dose and over 60 per cent have not had any vaccination at all.
He urged MPs to spread the vaccination message in their constituencies as he confirmed that no further lockdown measures will be imposed over and above the Plan B measures.