On Wednesday, the 4th of January, the European Union (EU) recommended its member states to request Covid-19 tests from travellers arriving from China. However, countries failed to reach an agreement on making these tests mandatory.
«Member states are urged to introduce a requirement for travellers that come from China to present a negative Covid-19 test result received no later than 48 hours before departing from China,» as announced at a meeting of the Council of Europe after a meeting of healthcare experts in Brussels. An agreement was reached on making it mandatory for passengers and crew of aircraft departing China to wear medical masks or FFP2 respirators.
These decisions are not binding to EU member states, but they are considered important guidelines.
It is planned to look into them around mid-January. Germany did previously attempt approval of a single set of rules in this area for Europe, as confirmed by German Minister of Health press-secretary.
«First of all we need to create a system to monitor variants of the virus,’ he added. Variants of the virus from China are currently circulating in Germany, ‘but we need to know early if something changes,» the press-secretary said.
Considering the new wave of coronavirus in China, the World Health Organisation (WHO) continues making attempts to gain more information from Chinese institutions. WHO Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he understands the decision of many countries, including ones in Europe, to request Covid-19 tests from travellers from China. He said the coronavirus variant XBB.1.5 has increased concerns around the world. This variant was discovered in October 2022 and is a lighter version of Covid-19 than all the previous variants.
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