The Government is holding urgent talks this afternoon over a potential ban on travel from Britain to Ireland amid concern over a new mutant strain of Covid-19.
Speaking on RTÉ’s This Week programme, Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said there will be an announcement on potential travel restrictions later today.
The Irish Times reports the Minister said it would be “naive” to think the new and more infectious strain had not already potentially arrived in the Republic.
Mr Donnelly said that other countries had put travel restrictions in place and the Government “is looking at exactly that same question”.
“We are looking at flights, we are looking at ferries, we are looking at travel to and from the island of Britain and Ireland generally and we are giving it a lot of serious consideration right now,” he said.
Asked if the Government was telling Irish people not to travel, he said: “The UK government is telling them they can’t come. Let’s be very clear on this. The UK government is not saying they should use their judgment. The UK government is saying that they cannot come.”
Naive
Mr Donnelly also expressed concern that the new variant may already be present in Ireland, despite there being no confirmed cases.
“I don’t think anything is inevitable but I will be very, very pleasantly surprised if it isn’t here,” he said, adding it would be “very naive to think it would not potentially be here”.
Asked if there would be restrictions between north and south on the island of Ireland, Mr Donnelly said they would not be “physical”.
“We certainly are not considering sealing the border physically. It is politically not practical but certainly what we could well be doing is looking at issuing very strong advice in terms of travel north and south,” he said.
It comes as several European countries, including Belgium and the Netherlands, have banned air travel from the UK over the new strain.
Ryanair and Aer Lingus have said neither intend to suspend flights between Ireland and the UK over the mutation that is currently spreading aggressively through the south-east of England.
If it is more transmissible, then it is probably only a matter of time before we’ll see it here
The relaxation of coronavirus rules for Christmas has been scrapped for millions of people in London and large parts of the south east of England, after the mutation caused a rapid increase in cases.
UK officials said it has been spreading 70 per cent faster, and already accounts for 28 per cent of London's infections.
The Government has said no test carried out by the National Virus Reference Laboratory (NVRL) up to Saturday night has yet detected the new strain of Covid-19 in the Republic.
However, the director of NVRL Dr Cillian De Gascun, has said it is “likely” the strain will arrive in the Republic at some point given the amount of travel between the two islands.
“We haven’t seen any trace of this new variant to date, but certainly over the coming weeks we’ll have to increase our vigilance in that respect because the virus does like to travel, and if it is more transmissible, then it is probably only a matter of time before we’ll see it here.”
It comes as families across the Republic have been urged to reconsider their Christmas plans by public health officials, amid rapidly rising Covid-19 growth independent of the new UK strain.
In Northern Ireland, people have been urged to keep their Christmas bubbles as small as possible amid the “aggressive new strain” of Covid-19.
