Europe Bans Visitors From the UK

The World Health Organization (WHO) announced it is urging its European members to strengthen measures against a new variant of COVID-19 currently circulating in the United Kingdom. In response, European nations including Germany, Ireland, Italy, Austria, Romania, The Netherlands, and Belgium said they were moving to block air travel with the UK.

For example, the Netherlands announced a no-fly time for air traffic with passengers from the United Kingdom as of December 20, 2020, at 6 a.m. local time. The flight ban will apply until 1 January 2021 at the latest. A spokeswoman for WHO Europe told AFP that "across Europe, where transmission is intense and widespread, countries need to redouble their control and prevention approaches."

Dr. Julian Tang, Honorary Associate Professor/Clinical Virologist, University of Leicester, recently stated “Regarding the N501Y mutation within the new B.1.1.7 lineage, part of the 20B/GR SARS-COV-2 clade, it was already defined in a EuroSurveillance paper published on August 13, 2020.