UK quarantine measures: where are the Covid hotspots?

Britain will “not hesitate” to add other countries to its quarantine list, chancellor Rishi Sunak said on Friday, as fears grow that rising numbers of Covid cases across Europe could disrupt the summer plans of thousands of UK holidaymakers.

Warning that there was “always the risk of disruption” to holidays during a global pandemic, Mr Sunak said the list of countries subject to Britain’s 14-day quarantine requirements was kept “under constant review”, following the addition of Belgium, Andorra and the Bahamas on Thursday.

The spotlight has now turned to France, which has recorded its highest number of daily coronavirus infections in more than two months, with 1,695 new cases reported within 24 hours.

But FT analysis of data from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) shows that France is still in a considerably better position than Spain, Belgium and other countries on the UK quarantine list. Instead the Netherlands may be a more likely candidate among larger European countries for new restrictions on returning travellers.

The criteria used in assessing whether travellers returning to Britain should self-isolate have not been published, but government officials say a number of tests are applied. As well as considering rates of infections and deaths, scientists look at the rate of acceleration of cases, the quality of monitoring and the measures in place in each country.

France recorded an average of 1.98 new cases a day per 100,000 people over the last week, compared with 1.23 in Britain. Belgium had a comparable rate of 3.14 and Spain had 7.46. Top of the list was Luxembourg with 10.43 new cases a day per 100,000.

But Spanish cases are still rising — up 50 per cent on last week — while those in Belgium are down by 27 per cent. The Netherlands has seen new cases almost double to 2.52 per day since last week.

The number of new Covid-19 cases reported depends partly on how thorough the country’s testing programme is. The key measure for this is the “positivity” rate — the percentage of tests giving a positive result — which indicates whether there is enough testing to find most cases. High positivity suggests an emphasis on testing the sickest patients, while a lower figure means more testing of people with milder or no symptoms. 

Greece and Sweden, two countries with similar sized populations, had strikingly different positivity rates. Greece carried out an average 20,310 tests per day over the past week and found 73 infections, a positivity figure of 0.36 per cent; Sweden, which performed 7,566 daily tests, found 204 positive cases — a positivity rate of 2.69 per cent.

Using this measure, Europe’s worst outbreaks are in Romania (7 per cent of tests are positive), Spain (5 per cent), Bulgaria (4.8 per cent) and Croatia (4.6 per cent). But all European countries lag behind the US, which has an average positivity rate of 7.4 per cent. This compares to 1.2 per cent in the UK, and 1.73 per cent in the Netherlands — although the latter is up by two-thirds in a week.

The data shows that two of the most popular Mediterranean holiday destinations, Italy and Greece, are suppressing Covid-19 with remarkable success. Italy, which suffered most when the pandemic first hit Europe, has just 0.48 new cases per day and a positivity rate of 1 per cent.

Britain’s quarantine list is reviewed every week, although ministers can move more quickly if there is a sudden surge in cases in a particular country. Under the country’s quarantine rules, arrivals must self-isolate for 14 days in a single place unless they are travelling from an exempt country. In England failure to self-isolate can result in a fine of up to £1,000.

But government officials admit the rules are not rigorously enforced and people can leave their quarantine address in exceptional circumstances — for example to buy food if home delivery is not possible, or to pick up medical supplies.

Figures released on July 27 showed that just one person had been fined for breaching quarantine rules in England and Wales.

However, holidaymakers could also be deterred from venturing abroad over concerns about obtaining travel insurance if they defy government advice.

In France travellers arriving from 16 countries outside the EU, including the US and India, must be tested for Covid-19 before arrival. 

There have been no restrictions in either direction between the UK and France since the UK lifted its 14-day quarantine requirement and France dropped its reciprocal “voluntary” quarantine for travellers from Britain.

Officials in Paris said France currently had no plan to reimpose quarantine measures to travellers from the UK, but would do so “as a matter of reciprocity” if the UK imposed them on people coming from France. 

Additional reporting: Victor Mallet in Paris