Any travellers arriving in the UK from overseas, including India, have to take a COVID-19 pre-departure test no sooner than 48 hours before their journey, under new rules in force from Tuesday aimed at slowing the spread of the Omicron variant. Any contacts of a suspected Omicron case are already required to self-isolate for 10 days, including those who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19.
Additionally, British and Irish citizens returning from the UK's red list travel ban countries - Angola, Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe - are required to hotel quarantine in a government-approved facility as the UK recorded 336 cases of the variant first detected in South Africa.
UK Health Secretary Sajid Javid confirmed community transmission of the highly transmissible COVID variant in a House of Commons statement on Monday. He also noted that no one who has tested positive with Omicron has been hospitalised, so far.
"The number of confirmed cases in the UK is 336 - they are all by definition infected. Some may be asymptomatic, others will be feeling ill. None of them, so far, as far as I am aware, have been hospitalised," Sajid Javid said.
"According to the latest data there are now 261 confirmed cases in England, 71 in Scotland and four in Wales, bringing the total number of confirmed cases across the UK to 336. This includes cases with no links to international travel. So, we can conclude that there is now community transmission across multiple regions of England," he said.
People arriving in the UK already had to self-isolate until they received a negative PCR test on day two after their arrival. With the latest measures, all travellers aged 12 and over will have to show proof of a negative PCR or lateral flow test before setting off for the UK.
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) has quoted scientific analysis to suggest that the window of infection may be shorter for Omicron than for the Delta variant, which is why these tests must be taken as close to the departure date as possible and no sooner than 48 hours prior to a flight.
07/12/21 Arjit Garg/Zee News
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