France transit/quarantine requirements are unfair

[Prochainesortie]

I know 5 families currently in relatively Covid safe European families (Eg Germany, Poland etc) visiting their own families who will now have to quarantine due to transiting France for a few hours and using the Eurotunnel. They won’t stay the night in France just refuel once due to driving distances, they won’t exit the car in the eurotunnel. 1 is my cleaner and she is panicking about no income on return. She doesn’t have online shopping and her children won’t be allowed out of her small flat to exercise for 14 days! The only reason she drove was to be safer and avoid airports! I think the U.K. government is unreasonable given France is such a transit country. More notice should have been given and they need to relax the transit requirements urgently. I agree that spending the night in France might increase the risk but 1-2 refuel/stop should be allowed as long as masks/sanitiser etc are used. My cleaner is driving in a big car with another family, I told her to look into driving through Germany for longer/carrying some fuel if possible. Hopefully she will find a way to avoid the quarantine legally by not having to stop.

[Lweji]

Why does the UK not test like any other intelligent country?

Actually, there's nothing intelligent about testing alone.
You can test negative coming out of your holidays, but become infectious a few days later. Or pick up the virus on the plane.

I'm not a fan of quarantine either, though.

If there's community transmission in the country, a few imported cases from holidays won't make much difference.

A country that really wants to keep the virus at bay will have quarantine and testing at the end.
But the UK isn't such a case because the virus is in circulation. That would be NZ for example. Or China, even.

[nosswith]

starchildmum a country where one of the main political parties chose Mr Johnson as leader is not an intelligent country.

I agree with you that testing should be taking place.

Overall the government's non-performance has been such that I doubt the English language has a suitable word for how bad it has been.

[SexTrainGlue]

Plus many work places don’t pay if you quarantine. Honestly do you think anyone who might have been in contact with a positive case will quarantine if there is no pay for 2 weeks?

I think the penny has finally dropped that quarantine is a real prospect on return here, plus potential for restrictions when away, and people will change their preferences when visits are not essential. Especially not in the short term, whilst there appear to be rises in case numbers across Europe

Why does the UK not test like any other intelligent country?

Testing does not release you from quarantine, because of the length of the incubation period. It's the WHO who recommends 14 days, based on the characteristics of the disease

[starchildmum]

Plus many work places don’t pay if you quarantine. Honestly do you think anyone who might have been in contact with a positive case will quarantine if there is no pay for 2 weeks? I wouldn’t.
So it all does not add up.

[starchildmum]

Why does the UK not test like any other intelligent country?
Because they are to stupid to handle it intelligently.
Yes, just lock them up. Jesus, no wonder it has the highest death rate in Europe.
Idiotic handling in all fronts.

[starchildmum]

I think its ridiculous. European families quarantining who where very cautious and in a remote spot abroad whilst English pub goers hang out and socialise. Again, a hideous political solution. Close pubs and
drinking events, but leave us a lone in peace to enjoy a peaceful couple of weeks in a beautiful summer house!

Happy to “quarantine”.

[SummerNamechangeHappened]

Any more France news???

[thecatsatonthewall]

Some of those countries don't apply to any EU states, only apply to certain types of lorry driver, is old info going back to june and with Malta, their link is broken.
Ireland still has a blanket ban.

I find it odd that Germany, the most successful european country in dealing with CV, has no travel quarantines, in fact no major EU state has.

So i suspect, that like everything this Government has done, its all about image and PR.

Whereas testing & a properly functioning track trace and app contact system would require some forethought, something sadly lacking.

[Lweji]

According to ec.europa.eu/transport/coronavirus-response_en?modes=All&category=3797

Bulgaria
Finland
Ireland
Lithuania
Malta
Romania
Slovakia

[thecatsatonthewall]

Who else in Europe is quarantining incoming travellers?

770,000 people work in the Airline industry alone, these measures will close the travel industry down for good.

There needs to be another means to stop imported infections (are there any?) especially as the very people who would act stupidly abroad will be the ones who won't quarantine - there is no enforcement plus plenty of opt outs & you can use public transport to get home.

[Lweji]

[quote ListeningQuietly]@Needmoresleep
If you test more you find more cases - Luxembourg
if you think you have it under control you suddenly discover that it has been spreading asymptomatically for weeks - New Zealand

COVID is NOT a serious disease
the treatment methods now designed mean that hardly anybody who goes into hospital with it will die

unlike malaria that kills 400,000 a year every year[/quote]

Covid has killed 770 00 in 8 months alone, and that's including the period of being established and severe coutry wide lockdowns. Unchecked, it would already be millions.

Do you even know malaria? Malaria isn't a serious disease by your reckoning. Most people survive. Many are asymptomatic.
Mortality is higher among small children, or people already with anaemia, which can be common in countries where under and malnutrition is common.
Most people die from lack of timely or appropriate treatment, in part due to distance or lack of access to health care.
Actual, untreatable severe malaria in healthy well nourished people with access to health care is rare.

Without diagnostic tools many people are diagnosed with malaria when they may have something else. And they die because antimalarials don't work.

But prevention is the most important thing. Adequate housing, bed nets, repellents... like prevention is best for covid.

[notimagain]

I have a polish cleaner op and she SUPPORTS brexit! Many polish, German and French friends do and quite vocally too. We have dutch friends that feel that way too, now more than ever thanks to the discord about the covid bailout fund.


I do rather get the impression some portions of the UK MSM love to talk up all this supposed "discord"...I've heard very little support for Brexit from the EU27 nationals in the UK I've worked with both in Europe and the UK ..and that includes quite a few Dutch nationals whose lives are going to be made much more difficult by that issue..not much being said by them about the bailout fund either..I suppose it depends who you work with.

BTW are we still waiting for the "tit for tat", "knee jerk" reaction from the French?

[LawrenceMarlow]

Cripes @Needmoresleep you sound very bitter and snobby about the European parents at your DD’s ex school. Not sure how that is relevant to this but hopefully you feel better for getting it off your chest.

[Friendsoftheearth]

If you want to continue to pay her, then do, perhaps drop ironing over to her instead? Silverware to be polished etc?

[Friendsoftheearth]

I have a polish cleaner op and she SUPPORTS brexit! Many polish, German and French friends do and quite vocally too. We have dutch friends that feel that way too, now more than ever thanks to the discord about the covid bailout fund.

We are in the financial services and I can assure you that our bankers are not going anywhere (we source people from all over the world) with many of the most talented and gifted young people in the world. It is a highly lucrative career that sees hundreds, sometimes thousands of outstanding applications for one post.
I don't think it will make the slightest difference if one or two decide to relocate due to covid or brext and should be expected, and most relocate within their company to a different country given most banks are international.

We have many friends and colleagues expats now returning from overseas. It will balance out.

I hardly think people moving home due to covid or other reasons will be a big surprise, having lived overseas for a number of years, you are entirely reliant on a regular operational airline service. Take that away with covid, and many expats regardless of where they are will be rethinking their living arrangements. Many move back to come back to British schools anyway.
We will benefit from the surge of highly skilled, wealthy expats moving home.

In the end it will all balance out. I certainly don't think it is anything to worry about.

[Splodgetastic]

I think I can also manage without German, French, Swiss and Italian banker types coming back here with their germs, even if they are paying 45% tax. I also pay 45% tax and so does my husband and we have had one holiday this year. In February and in the UK when everyone else was superspreading around Europe's skiing areas.

[Splodgetastic]

Personally I wouldn't pay the cleaner as she knew the rules.

[Splodgetastic]

Look, the problem when you go outside your native country is that you have to deal with completely different laws and morals. That's the deal. I have worked in a number of other countries. In one of them I had to deal with a situation in which I was pregnant and did not want to be and did not have any choice about what to do. Fortunately I was only there for a short-term secondment but it made me realise that I was completely on my own and had to take responsibility for myself - neither the company I worked for nor my own country could have helped me and I had to deal. Fortunately the matter was taken out of my hands.

[Needmoresleep]

OP has been very clear that her cleaner dislikes the UK and disagrees with Brexit and is planning to leave.

Its fine. I lived in Germany for a couple of years, made lots of friends and liked some aspects, but at the end of the day I much prefer living in the UK. (And quite understand why Germans feel the opposite.)

[ListeningQuietly]

Needmoresleep
Part of me hopes that the OPs cleaner works at your DDs school and they are literally left in the shit when she goes home.

Can you not see your racist xenophobic exceptionalism dripping onto the thread?

[Needmoresleep]

I fund it nasty, even if I did not get badly. I was totally wiped out for over a month and am still getting bouts of extreme fatigue.

I know people who got it far worse and who, months later, are still really struggling. But useful to know it is not a serious disease.

Malaria is serious, but not common in the UK so no precautions are needed. And not spread by human to human contact.

[Needmoresleep]

No,

if you are not happy in a country it is better to leave than stay and moan.

Yes Britain is not Germany or Poland. But many people don't want them to be. Identity cards, registering your address, etc will make contact tracing easier, but many people in Britain don't want to live in a more conformist society.

DD went to a private school in West London with a large number of affluent European parents. Long before Brexit, the whining was constant. England could not run a transport system, England could not run a University system (quite specific - apparently universities in Sweden are far far better and all British Universities are crap), London couold not clear snow like European cities, and on and on.

An 11 year old DD came home and asked why, when you are supposed to work very hard to treat everyone equally, flagrant racism against the English was allowed. Of course the French and the Spanish are handling CV better. I can almost hear some of the parents in DDs Yr7 class saying this. The deep snobbishness laced with the deep certainty that they were Masters of the Universe because of their high paying jobs and their nondom status, and Brits were just peasants. And the great surprise if their over tutors totally special DC were beaten in a test by a mere local.

Obviously not everyone, but enough. Part of the moaning will be unhappiness and missing a different culture. But really it sounds like it is time for your cleaner to go home. Not least because it sounds as if the jobs will be there not here.

[ListeningQuietly]

@Needmoresleep
If you test more you find more cases - Luxembourg
if you think you have it under control you suddenly discover that it has been spreading asymptomatically for weeks - New Zealand

COVID is NOT a serious disease
the treatment methods now designed mean that hardly anybody who goes into hospital with it will die

unlike malaria that kills 400,000 a year every year

[Needmoresleep]

Are you sure about the 1/1000 death rate.

There is a huge amount that is not known, including the number of asymptomatic infections, but I thought that even the most favourable stats were not this good, and the risks that go with obesity, BAME, diabetes etc are a lot higher. And that is before the long term effects are known. I would have thought that it was near impossible to have lived through the first few weeks of lockdown with the absolutely constant sounds of ambulances, and not be concerned.

Enough to know that it is not worth seeing granny. Or indeed do anything that increases the risk of catching it or passing it on.

[Prochainesortie]

@Needmoresleep - my cleaner’s family originally came to stay long term more than 10 years ago but they have since been made to feel unwelcome, since Brexit. Perhaps you could learn to spell xenophobia before you throw such terms around. I know 5 NHS workers in a similar position. Lots of rich German, Italian, Dutch and French banker types too. They are fed up with Brexit and the handling of Coronavirus here as compared to the countries they grow up in - they are all planning a get out now. It is not going to be great losing those 45 per cent tax payers to Frankfurt and Paris whatever some of you may think/say nor is it great in a housing crisis to lose qualified and competent construction workers.