The borders in Europe are rising again with quarantines and mandatory tests

The borders of Europe are closing again and Belgium is now prohibiting non-essential travel. France is demanding negative tests from all EU visitors and Germany in order to reduce air traffic to “almost zero”.

Since virus deaths are still piling up across Europe and governments are alarmed by new Covid-19 strains, the EU’s travel restrictions go beyond the isolation of Great Britain and are now also restricting freedom of movement on the continent.

France and Italy are among the countries that require negative testing from across the EU, with France generally requiring gold standard PCR testing, although UK carriers are allowed faster screening.

Germany usually has a 10-day quarantine, but is also reviewing the test results of some high-risk countries and preparing to control the nine normally free-flowing land borders more strictly.

Liberal Sweden has no quarantine policy at all, while Switzerland takes a more surgical approach and selects particularly vulnerable areas of neighboring countries.

Travel from outside Europe is still kept to a minimum across the EU, with some countries placing special demands on Brazil and South Africa, which also have their own alarming strains of the disease.

It comes as the UK creates a “red list” of countries whose travelers will be subject to 10 days hotel quarantine upon arrival in the UK after Boris Johnson’s administration was criticized for keeping borders open earlier in the pandemic.

Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron asked for additional analysis of the spread of the coronavirus on Wednesday before deciding whether new restrictions are needed, government spokesman Gabriel Attal said.

Macron is under pressure to put in a third lockdown after it was revealed that the 6 p.m. nightly curfew isn’t slowing infections and after the daily hospital admissions hit an eight-week high of 27,041 on Tuesday.

Infection rates are rising sharply in Portugal (green) and Spain (purple), although they are falling in the UK (light blue) and appear to have peaked in Italy and Germany

Death rates remain stubbornly high in much of Europe and have skyrocketed in Portugal after cases have spiked, while the UK’s daily death rate appears to be at a plateau since cases have fallen

The borders are rising again in many EU countries:

FRANCE: NEGATIVE TEST REQUIRED

After fears over the UK’s new strain of the virus led France last month to demand negative tests from incoming truckers, the French government has now expanded its measures across the EU.

Individuals arriving from EU countries by air or sea must present a negative test dated less than 72 hours earlier. However, the controls do not apply to people entering by road or rail.

The rules are stricter for people from the UK who can only travel for specific reasons and sometimes have to isolate for seven days in addition to a negative test.

However, this does not apply to cross-channel freight forwarders, who also have a special exception, ie they can carry out so-called “lateral flow” tests, which give a faster result than PCR tests.

Those who come to France are subject to the nationwide curfew, which currently runs from 6:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. During this time, official documentation is required to get around, including leaving the country.

GERMANY: EXAMS FOR HIGH RISK AREAS

Germany is considering almost completely suspending flights to the country in order to slow down the spread of infectious virus strains, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said on Tuesday.

Under current regulations, people entering from high risk countries such as the UK are required to present a negative test result within the last 48 hours.

There is also a lower tier of countries, including France and Italy, that do not require a test, but do require people to go into a 10-day quarantine, which can be shortened to five if they test negative during their isolation.

The federal police are already carrying out controls at the land borders, and Seehofer warned that these could become “considerably stricter” – and at the same time suggested that air traffic be “reduced to almost zero”.

Angela Merkel told party colleagues that Germans had the right to expect “certain precautionary measures at the border,” with hundreds of deaths piling up every day.

GERMAN-CZECH BORDER: People are lining up at a test center in Folmava on Monday to cross the border into Germany, which has stricter controls in mind at the nine normally free-flowing land borders

ITALY: NEGATIVE TEST REQUIRED

Visitors from most of Europe are not required to provide a compelling reason to enter Italy, but they are required to show a negative result from a test carried out within the last 48 hours.

People who fail to present a negative test will be isolated and placed under “health surveillance,” the Italian government says.

The negative test requirement does not apply to the mini states of San Marino and Vatican City or a handful of low risk countries such as Australia and New Zealand.

However, stricter rules for the UK mean people can only enter from the UK if they were registered as Italians before December 23rd, or if they have a “reason for absolute necessity” to travel to Italy.

And there are even stricter rules for Brazil, where there are no flights to Italy at all and where anyone who was recently in the South American country when the ban was imposed had to get a test.

SPAIN: NEGATIVE TEST REQUIRED

Spain’s list of high risk areas where a negative test is required spans essentially the whole of the EU as well as numerous “third countries” such as the UK and Brazil.

Travelers wishing to travel to Spain must fill out a form that generates a QR code that they can show to border guards when they arrive at Spanish airports.

The tourism-dependent country has campaigned with the EU to set up “vaccine certificates” that could enable people to evade travel restrictions once they get a sting.

“Vaccine certification is something we are inevitably heading for,” the country’s foreign minister, Arancha Gonzalez, said last week. Spain is in the midst of an alarming surge in infections.

BELGIUM: SIGNIFICANT TRAVEL PROHIBITED

To date, non-essential travel to or from Belgium is prohibited until March 1st. The government says it will monitor arrivals by rail, road, air and sea.

The country wants to avoid repeating last winter when the Belgians went on alpine skiing holidays and brought the virus with them, or the Christmas and New Years period when an estimated 160,000 residents went abroad.

“When people travel, the virus travels with them, and we found, through sampling, that people who have traveled have more cases of the variants than those who haven’t,” said Prime Minister Alexander De Croo.

Anyone attempting to enter must write down their main reasons on an “affidavit”, which may include travel for medical reasons or for everyday cross-border activities.

There are generally no other restrictions on those who have access – but people coming from the UK, South Africa and South America must be quarantined for 10 days.

An empty check-in area at Brussels Airport in Zaventem, Belgium, today

BELGIUM: Police officers watch a car approach a border crossing near France on Wednesday after the smaller country banned non-essential journeys in and out of the country

SWEDEN: NO QUARANTINE

In line with the liberal approach it has taken during the pandemic, Sweden does not require EU arrivals to quarantine and does not even require masks at its airports.

However, there is an outright travel ban from the UK, requiring negative tests for the few people who may be allowed to enter for substantial reasons.

An entry ban from outside the EU will remain in place until at least March 31st.

There are also stricter rules for Norway and Denmark, where the British strain of the virus has already been discovered and where people can only enter Sweden for specific reasons.

Those who make it to Sweden from high risk countries should isolate for seven days, but this is not mandatory.

SWITZERLAND: QUARANTINE FOR SELECTED AREAS

Switzerland’s 10-day quarantine rule only applies to a relatively small list of countries, including the UK, the US, Portugal and the Netherlands.

In addition, the Swiss authorities have identified particularly endangered areas in neighboring countries – only two federal states and three regions of Italy are subject to quarantine rules.

However, under new rules slated to go into effect in early February, people will also have to present a negative test result – although this may allow them to shorten their quarantine period.

Switzerland said today it is ready to spend more than $ 1 billion on testing for asymptomatic covicases and said it is likely to be responsible for most of the new infections.

AUSTRIA: A police officer and an Austrian soldier speak to a driver who is crossing the border from the Czech Republic into the Alpine country and who is doing random checks at its land borders