Covid experts warn against foreign holidays, so why is Boris Johnson so keen? | Polly Toynbee
As the delay on restricting arrivals from India suggests, the prime minister might have political reasons for his lax approach
“Fly now pay later”, offers one finance company, which gives loans for holidays, including those to Portugal and other green-listed countries. We may all end up paying later for those flying off to sun, sea and Covid. One travel company, Tui, alone has 19 flights to Portugal next week, eight of them now using Dreamliners, which have space for up to 345 people.
Prof Martin McKee, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, says he finds the new travel rules bizarre. “Why Portugal? It might be OK if people only met Portuguese- and British-vaccinated people – but they’ll mix with others from France, Italy and Spain, mixing at airports, waiting in queues.” Oxford University professor John Bell, of the government’s vaccine task force, is optimistic that the vaccines will protect against the variant first detected in India, but still strongly warns against foreign holidays this summer, for fear of importing fresh mutant strains. With about half of the UK population unvaccinated, a wait of several weeks after getting jabbed before vaccines are as effective as possible, and with some still vulnerable after vaccination, risk abounds. In the past week, infections and deaths rose: watch ministers now blaming any resurgence on vaccine refusers, nudging blame on to poor people and ethnic minorities.
