Germany looks set to relax its quarantine entry requirements for fully-vaccinated Britons.
The German chancellor Angela Merkel visited the UK on Friday (July 2) to meet British prime minister Boris Johnson, with travel curbs high on their agenda.
In a press conference following their talks at Chequers – the prime minister’s residence in Buckinghamshire – she said Germany is “continuously reviewing” its Covid travel restrictions.
She said Germany had introduced restrictions in response to the Delta variant, which she said was now spreading “very rapidly” in her country.
“We are reviewing continuously our travel restrictions and we think that in the foreseeable future those who have received double jabs will then, according to our classification – and now Britain obviously is a high incidence area – will be able to travel again without having to go into quarantine,” she said.
Last week, she said urged other European countries to follow Germany’s lead by introducing tougher restrictions for UK travellers because of concerns about the Delta variant.
Since May, travellers from the UK have been banned from entering Germany, apart from a few limited exceptions.
Those who are allowed in from the UK must quarantine for 14 days.
Johnson is expected to announce the latest steps towards ending lockdown in England in the next few days, with international travel high on the agenda.
The Daily Mail reported: “Her comments today, following bilateral talks with Mr Johnson on the subject, pave the way for quarantine-free travel to open up across Europe in a massive boost for British holidaymakers.”
Furthermore, Johnson added that there is “no reason” why Britons would be excluded from the EU’s travel passport scheme because they had received AstraZeneca Covid-19 doses made in India.
He was “very confident” the issue would not be a problem, said the Telegraph.
It followed reports that up to five million Britons who had received certain doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine may not be able to travel to Europe because their vaccine was not recognised by the EU’s Digital Covid Certificate scheme.