Mandatory hotel quarantine in the UK

[Circumlocutious]

There was the New Zealand thread which touched on this, but I thought it’s helpful to have a more targeted discussion. Mandatory hotel quarantine for all UK arrivals, likely to be signed off on tomorrow.

Twitter thread from FT journalist discussing some of the complex aspects involved:

mobile.twitter.com/SebastianEPayne/status/1353657496716660737

Do you think it’ll ‘work’? (presumably its main purpose is to stop new covid variants from coming in). Why / why not?

Having a list of exemption for certain countries and people renders the whole plan pointless.
We only need one to slip through the net and we are back to square one unless a swift perfect Track and trace service gets down on it like a ton of a brick wall like in New Zealand.

The virus started from one person and now it’s everywhere.
Like usual their plans are half baked useless plans.

I don’t understand the point if we have to have a negative test anyway, isn’t that enough? I live in another country and all
I’d like to do at some point is see my parents and for them to spend time with their granddaughter. I’d happily take the test and stay in my parents house and garden for two weeks.
How long will this be in place do we know? Making me anxious thinking about it

I agree it's necessary. Testing before entry only tells you someone was negative at a moment in time. Not about what happens after/ when they get on the flight etc. My only concern is Covid spreading from infected people to non-infected people in the hotel. I guess people might need more testing on leaving and life in the hotel strictly monitored. I do feel for people with loved ones abroad but the reality is we need to get day to day life back to normal here and if we get things under control here, we can't risk bringing in more Covid/ different strains because people want to go abroad. People should only be travelling for exceptional reasons so the hotels shouldn't be bursting at the seams anyway!

For those with family overseas - well, this is part of the judgement you make when you emigrate

When my parents moved to France in 2001 I don't think a global pandemic was top of the list of things they considered when weighing up the pros and cons.

I also have close family in France and Germany. I know what this is like, much as you are trying to make out I don't and that you are suffering more.

I still think we should have closed our borders to tourists - to & from, and any travel not for essential supply or essential business purposes.

The thing is, if UK citizens work abroad temporarily - as Gastarbeiter, basically - then again, the costs of doing so need to be factored in.

There are always risks to making such choices. If you're prepared to take the profit, you must also be prepared to take the losses.

I hope I will see my mother (in Australia) and my last remaining aunt (in Germany) in person alive. But I also think of all the deaths from this disease, and all those others who won't see family or friends alive.

Because, no this isn't all about me. This pandemic has shown just how we're all - strangers - interconnected. That there is such a thing as society, not just individuals & families, and our actions taken can have consequences for complete strangers.

“Of course, no-one expected a global pandemic, but to assume that there would never be obstacles to easy cheap available travel and communications is also very foolhardy.”

Yes climate change policies as one example.....

I can't see that it's such a bad idea.

Having to holiday at home increased New Zealands's GDP by 14% last year so it's not so bad.

The main issue will be that everyone will still insist on going to Cornwall. Good luck with that.

This is pure populism and it won't work.

^That.

For those with family overseas - well, this is part of the judgement you make when you emigrate

I didn't know when I arrived on a strictly only 6 month student work permit in 1991 that I would A) still be here 30 yrs later B) during a pandemic. Damn that faulty crystal ball.

If it means opening schools sooner then yes please!

The whole pandemic = choose between my parents & my kids.

My cousin in California just posted pics about taking her kids to a theme park

I love the comments on Twitter about how the June G7 meeting will take place in ... Cornwall.

I know several people who went on holiday over Christmas. One had photos all over Facebook. Honestly makes me rage!

Obviously there should be travel for business and family reasons but holiday is should be a no-no. The one I mentioned has photos of hand gliding, hotel photos and general holidaying photos. She "needed" a break. She works in care.

I think it should be difficult for people go go abroad unless they prove it is family or work related. It family member managed to go to Spain 4/5 times last year!

I cancelled my match holiday as clearly that wouldn't have been sensible.

So no I don't think there should be mandatory hotel stays, poor staff to start with. I think people should go and if they have to for the above reasons then I am sure the majority will be sensible enough.

I'd rather wear an ankle tag and be monitored at home than end up in a shitty Travel Lodge with not even a change of bedding for two weeks!

Thankfully I have no need to travel (UK holidays until restrictions are lifted) but I really feel for those who do for work.

@QueenoftheAir - what about those people who haven’t exactly chosen to be overseas - the military on peacekeeping missions, diplomats on overseas posting, aid workers?

I'd rather wear an ankle tag and be monitored at home than end up in a shitty Travel Lodge with not even a change of bedding for two weeks!

That's definitely the better of the two options. Unfortunately that one doesn't put money in the pockets of whichever hotel chain is the lucky recipient of the government's munificince.

@PinkSparklyPussyCat

I'd rather wear an ankle tag and be monitored at home than end up in a shitty Travel Lodge with not even a change of bedding for two weeks!

Thankfully I have no need to travel (UK holidays until restrictions are lifted) but I really feel for those who do for work.

How would they stop you having visitors?

It could work, if people will have to give their reason for entering the country. If they have been working on that can't be done remotely, e.g. an engineer fixing specialist equipment abroad, or people on oil/gas platforms etc, miltary etc, then they could be offered the opportunity to quarantine at home/on base. Their employment would have to be verified before being allowed home to isolate, so might have to be in a hotel until checks were complete (unless you could supply evidence in advance of return to UK)

However anyone else entering or re-entering the country for non-essential reasons would quarantine in a hotel (at their expense) . I would include quarantining business people who went to meetings that could have taken place over video/phone and high-net worth individuals. If Australia can get the international tennis players to isolate then same can and should apply to the jet-setters here too.

Unfortunately there were too many people who did not fully quarantine over the summer, they thought it was ok to pop out to the shops or had visitors and its impossible to enforce properly, self-enforcement didn't work. How is that fair on everyone else with their kids not in school or their business/employers closed and unable to work because infection rates are too high?

Or your family members going out for that matter

Does anyone know how this will affect Uni students? DD meant to go back to the UK for University.

I know students who returned to universities abroad had to quarantine for 10 days when they got there.

How would they stop you having visitors?

I'd rather be welded in my house China style (providing they didn't damage the front door) rather than suffer a Travel Lodge for 2 weeks!

All joking aside, I wonder if you'd be able to pay extra for a better room in a nicer hotel or if a hotel is allocated to you. Surely if you're expected to pay you should get some say in where you end up.

I've also been thinking about the logistics, presuming I had to quarantine for 2 weeks either end and had a 2 weeks stay in the middle I'd need to take an extra suitcase with me with 6 weeks of toiletries, medication and peppermint tea bags as well as all the extra clothes and underwear I'd need!

International boarders at DS's school had to quarantine in hotels when they returned to their home country for Christmas

[quote ineedaholidaynow]@Indoctro why should your DH be exempt to quarantine here, when other countries think he should quarantine. Why dos he suddenly become special in this country? There is a reason he has to quarantine in other countries, that same reason applies here too.[/quote]
Because he lives here, this is his country. , he is quarantining in other countries because he is a entering there country so they can ask him to do so

But essential workers keeping your car on the road and your home powered should be allowed to return to their home after stuck away for months working 15 hours a day with not a single day off. These guys are essential workers. The world hasn't stopped moving completely because of covid. Jobs still need done.

They're saying you'll have to pay for it, not entirely how they're going to enforce that one. Fair enough for non UK citizens as they can be turned back and sent home, but when I come back form my hypothetical fortnight in Zanzibar any quarantine will be at Boris's pleasure. Maybe I'll get a crap hotel or even a detention center, but at the end of the day if you're being locked in a room for 10 days who cares.

@PinkSparklyPussyCat

How would they stop you having visitors?

I'd rather be welded in my house China style (providing they didn't damage the front door) rather than suffer a Travel Lodge for 2 weeks!

All joking aside, I wonder if you'd be able to pay extra for a better room in a nicer hotel or if a hotel is allocated to you. Surely if you're expected to pay you should get some say in where you end up.

I've also been thinking about the logistics, presuming I had to quarantine for 2 weeks either end and had a 2 weeks stay in the middle I'd need to take an extra suitcase with me with 6 weeks of toiletries, medication and peppermint tea bags as well as all the extra clothes and underwear I'd need!

There must be different tiers of hotel as there are too many people for them to all be same standard, if I was going to be stuck in one for 2 weeks I would want to pay a bit more, I can't see people like the Beckhams when they return from their shopping trips wanting to stay in somewhere not so nice. There is also the luggage issue as you say, I'm no sure I would have enough underwear for all this. I wonder if people will think of this,

@PinkSparklyPussyCat

How would they stop you having visitors?

I'd rather be welded in my house China style (providing they didn't damage the front door) rather than suffer a Travel Lodge for 2 weeks!

All joking aside, I wonder if you'd be able to pay extra for a better room in a nicer hotel or if a hotel is allocated to you. Surely if you're expected to pay you should get some say in where you end up.

I've also been thinking about the logistics, presuming I had to quarantine for 2 weeks either end and had a 2 weeks stay in the middle I'd need to take an extra suitcase with me with 6 weeks of toiletries, medication and peppermint tea bags as well as all the extra clothes and underwear I'd need!

Ha. I was reading a post about Aus quarantine from someone who couldn’t open their hotel window even. The thought of landing in that sunshine and dealing with that made me baulk.

The (very) long list of exempted professions that can currently travel for work don’t even have to have a covid test, let alone isolate so it would be quite a big leap if they started quarantining all of them in hotels.

[quote QuentinInQuarantino]**@MaxNormal* @SophocIestheFox*

But people will tell you to suck it up because they've made sacrifices too because they haven't seen their mum since Xmas. [/quote]
Belittling other people’s sacrifices is not very kind. There are many with family in this country too who haven’t been able to see each other for months/nearly a year.

Choosing to live in a different country to your family is just that, a choice. Granted, no one could predict this, but it does obviously present more difficulties and hurdles than being able to jump in a car to get somewhere.

No one is meeting family at the moment anyway, so in some respect it doesn’t matter where they live. Hopefully this is one measure that will make a difference, to allow some things to open up gradually.

No one is banning travel, just enforcing a quarantine which was always there anyway...just that people didn’t do it, or didn’t think it applied to them. I knew of many people from abroad who travelled here for 2 weeks to stay with family. Those family members then carried on going to work. Well that can’t be right?

To me it’s common sense and should have been done sooner.