Conflicting update re holidays

[waterlane]

So Matt Hancock confirmed they are looking at scrapping the quarantine if you've been double jabbed this morning and this afternoon Boris basically says don't get your hopes up for travel. Why the conflicting advice and news all the time?? I just don't get it.

Surely the same must apply to England? Great news!

Scotland has done the same so England must follow.

England same
mobile.twitter.com/grantshapps/status/1408131071816970242?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1408131071816970242%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.co.uk%2Fnews%2Flive%2Fuk-57592006

So no Greek Islands, I wish they'd be more bloody transparent about the logic behind the decisions.

Grant Shapps has just tweeted that double vaxxed UK residents should be able to skip quarantine returning from Amber countries "later in the summer" but they won't be announcing details until next month. So typical of this Govt to create confusion, leave everyone in limbo and cause more misery for the travel industry and its workers by kicking the can down the road again. And let's not forget the reason we're in the mess we're in with cases rising is because they didn't shut the border to India fast enough.

@userchange8945

So no Greek Islands, I wish they'd be more bloody transparent about the logic behind the decisions.

Agree. Some of the Greek islands are recording no cases at all at the minute.

@Loudestcat14

Grant Shapps has just tweeted that double vaxxed UK residents should be able to skip quarantine returning from Amber countries "later in the summer" but they won't be announcing details until next month. So typical of this Govt to create confusion, leave everyone in limbo and cause more misery for the travel industry and its workers by kicking the can down the road again. And let's not forget the reason we're in the mess we're in with cases rising is because they didn't shut the border to India fast enough.

I read I’d not start til end of July I think

Even if they do scrap the 10 days isolation on return, the increased test requirement will add too much on top of the holiday for us to bother.

So boris is, presumably, off to either Caribbean or the Balearics for his holiday?

I’d love to know what they actually base these decisions on, if it’s not where the PM fancies for a week away.

Rates are really low in Europe finally. I can't blame any country for not allowing travel from UK at the moment.

Yes, apparently the UK has the worst case numbers in Europe now.

So I guess whether we are free to travel is only half the story. Why on earth would they want to let us in?

This is just a 'good news' story to divert attention away from the schools self-isolation catastrophe.

@TheresWaldo

Rates are really low in Europe finally. I can't blame any country for not allowing travel from UK at the moment.

If they have any sense they’d all have us on their red list. It seems many of them will want the money and be willing to take the risk. Tourism over the health of their population. Madness

@TheresWaldo

Rates are really low in Europe finally. I can't blame any country for not allowing travel from UK at the moment.

So rates are lower I'm countries that have half the % of population vaccinated? Really?

@TheresWaldo

Rates are really low in Europe finally. I can't blame any country for not allowing travel from UK at the moment.

Well, there are about 45 countries in Europe (and the UK is one of them). I doubt they all have the same rate.

@Loudestcat14

Grant Shapps has just tweeted that double vaxxed UK residents should be able to skip quarantine returning from Amber countries "later in the summer" but they won't be announcing details until next month. So typical of this Govt to create confusion, leave everyone in limbo and cause more misery for the travel industry and its workers by kicking the can down the road again. And let's not forget the reason we're in the mess we're in with cases rising is because they didn't shut the border to India fast enough.

This is what is most frustrating. They know already what their plan is but leave us in limbo again

timesofmalta.com/articles/view/uk-adds-malta-to-quarantine-free-green-list.881857 Maltese newspaper now seems to be reporting that arrivals from the U.K. will need to be fully jabbed. I am not familiar with the paper but it looks legit but apologies if I am spreading fake news, I don't think I am tho ☹️

@WrongKindOfFace

So boris is, presumably, off to either Caribbean or the Balearics for his holiday?

I’d love to know what they actually base these decisions on, if it’s not where the PM fancies for a week away.

That’s exactly what I came on to say. The green list looks like a list of places our esteemed MPs may go on holiday but not the general public as much

We've had one UK break but won't be booking anymore and couldn't even if we wanted to the way everything's booked up! ... it's not like for like that if you stop travel people will take those holidays here

But that's what is happening. That's why everything is booked up, because people are taking holidays here instead.

There's an interesting article in the Telegraph today pointing out that we are testing 10 times as many as Germany, and 4 times as many people as France. If they were testing at a similar rate, their numbers wouldn't look so different from ours. Our test positivity rate is slightly lower than France and Germany and considerably lower than the Netherlands.

So, yes, we are reporting a lot more cases than other places in Europe but that is because we are looking much harder to find them

I saw that too - well only the first sentence as it’s behind a paywall. Interesting if it is indeed true?

I highlighted it the last week that France + Germany = uk in number of tests, so of course uk is going to find more than them. Germany's numbers in hospital and deaths is also currently higher than the British ones.

@Alwaysfrank

There's an interesting article in the Telegraph today pointing out that we are testing 10 times as many as Germany, and 4 times as many people as France. If they were testing at a similar rate, their numbers wouldn't look so different from ours. Our test positivity rate is slightly lower than France and Germany and considerably lower than the Netherlands.

So, yes, we are reporting a lot more cases than other places in Europe but that is because we are looking much harder to find them

Without reading the article, difficult to criticise, but I suspect they've included LF tests in their numbers which makes a mockery of the whole thing, esp as a +ve LF test is followed by a PCR.

If you compare like with like, i.e. PCR tests only, then the UK and Germany are testing at similar rates, but the UK is finding 14x as many cases.

ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-testing

There's obviously (?) no point in comparing raw case numbers.

Generally in France ATM the incidence of the delta variant is being quoted at about 10% of those testing positive...in the clusters (e.g. Alsace) it's being quoted at about 29%.

Number of tests is a meaningless measure. You need number relative to population to compare extent of the spread of disease.

@EasterIssland

I highlighted it the last week that France + Germany = uk in number of tests, so of course uk is going to find more than them. Germany's numbers in hospital and deaths is also currently higher than the British ones.

Surely the death rates and hospitalisations are what really matters? Everyone seems to agree that covid isn't going anywhere so there will always be positive cases, what's the plan long term, isn't that what we need to be thinking about in terms of travel