EU Commission says an overwhelming majority of countries are in favour of pre-departure COVID testing, as China plans to lift travel restrictions
The European Commission has announced that the majority of European Union countries favour the introduction of preflight COVID tests for travellers from China.
According to a report by Reuters on Tuesday, January 3, this decision emerged after a meeting between the Health Security Committee, an EU advisory body of national health experts from 27 countries.
The meeting which was chaired by the Commission, concluded that “These measures would need to be targeted at the most appropriate flights and airports and carried out in a coordinated way to ensure their effectiveness”.
A draft proposal for the talks was also prepared by the Commission and included several recommendations for passengers travelling from China.
This included wearing masks on flights, monitoring the aircraft´s wastewater, genome surveillance at airports and increased vigilance by the EU on COVID testing and vaccinations.
A statement quoted in the report by the Commission spokesperson said, “This will now be revised and adopted based on the input of (EU) Member States” adding, “more talks on the measures would take place at another meeting of EU health officials on Wednesday afternoon”.
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