Travel update: Which countries are on the red list?
From 17 May, international travel was given the official go-ahead in Britain by the Global Travel Taskforce, subject to a traffic light system.
Since then, the “red list” of highest-risk destinations has fluctuated but remained long, with 62 destinations on there at the last update on 26 August.
On 17 September, the Department for Transport (DfT) announced that from 4 October, the three traffic light lists will be scrapped, leaving just the red list and one other list of “safe for travel” destinations, comprised of the merged green and amber lists.
From 4am on 22 September, eight countries will also move from the current red list to the amber list, meaning they’ll go on to join the new “safe” or “ROW” (rest of the world) list from 4 October.
This followed a week of anonymous leaks suggesting that the red list would be “slashed” or “halved”, which has not been the case.
The countries being removed from the red list on 22 September are: Turkey, Pakistan, the Maldives, Egypt, Sri Lanka, Oman, Bangladesh and Kenya.
This will reduce the red list to 54 countries. It is understood that the red list will then go on to be reviewed every three weeks, as the traffic light lists have been this summer - with more destinations expected to be removed in the coming months.
Which countries are on the red list?
The government has mandated hotel quarantine for Britons returning from high-risk or “red list” countries to stop new coronavirus infections and variants of concern entering the UK.
According to transport secretary Grant Shapps, red list countries are “those which should not be visited except in the most extreme of circumstances”.
Here’s the full red list at present:
Afghanistan
Angola
Argentina
Bangladesh
Bolivia
Botswana
Brazil
Burundi
Cape Verde
Chile
Colombia
Costa Rica
Cuba
Democratic Republic of Congo
Dominican Republic
Ecuador
Egypt
Eritrea
Eswatini
Ethiopia
French Guiana
Georgia
Guyana
Haiti
Indonesia
Kenya
La Réunion
Lesotho
Malawi
Maldives
Mayotte
Mexico
Mongolia
Montenegro
Mozambique
Myanmar
Namibia
Nepal
Oman
Pakistan
Panama
Paraguay
Peru
Philippines
Rwanda
Seychelles
Sierra Leone
Somalia
South Africa
Sri Lanka
Sudan
Suriname
Tanzania
Thailand
Trinidad and Tobago
Tunisia
Turkey
Uganda
Uruguay
Venezuela
Zambia
Zimbabwe
From 4am on 22 September, however, the following countries will be removed, taking the list to 54 countries:
Turkey
Pakistan
The Maldives
Egypt
Sri Lanka
Oman
Bangladesh
Kenya
What determines whether a country is high risk?
As the move to use quarantine hotels is primarily in response to new variants of concern of Covid-19, it’s likely that a country will be deemed “high risk” if one of the variants of concern has been identified and is prevalent there.
As well as the UK’s own Kent variant, named B.1.1.7, other mutations have been found in South Africa (1.351), Brazil (P.1) and India (B.1.617.2). This last, known as the Delta variant, is up to 60 per cent more transmissible than the Kent mutation and is already prevalent in the UK. The Beta variant has also been identified as a concern, with France previously put into its own special “amber plus” category in response to this mutation being detected there. The country was moved back to the amber list in the following travel review.
Read more: Who pays for hotel quarantine and how long will it last?
According to the second Global Travel Taskforce report, published on 9 April, the key factors in assessing a country’s risk factor are its rate of infection, the prevalence of variants of concern and the progress of its vaccination programme. Reliability of data and genomic sequencing capability are also taken into account.
Where do high risk travellers stay and how do they get there?
A number of hotels have been contracted for the mandatory quarantine for all red list arrivals. Bath Road, which runs parallel to the runway at London Heathrow airport, has been dubbed “Isolation Row”.
Travellers are privately “escorted” to their quarantine hotel upon arrival.
Fines of up to £10,000 apply to arrivals who fails to undergo the stipulated hotel quarantine, while people who misrepresent their travel history on the passenger locator forms face up to 10 years in prison.
Travellers must finance the quarantine themselves, at a cost of £2,285 per person for those travelling alone, which includes 10 days' (11 nights') room and board. Additional people in the same hotel room pay less. The second person pays only £1,430, with further discounts for children aged five-12: £325 each. It’s free for children under five.
How long is quarantine?
The current quarantine for all red list arrivals into the UK is 10 days and 11 nights.
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