European Union (EU) member states have reached an agreement to temporarily limit entry into South Africa to prevent the spread of a new strain of COVID-19, Reuters reported.
Slovenia, the chair of the EU touring in the second half of this year, said in a personal social media post that the 27 member health expert committees “agreed on the need to trigger an ’emergency brake’ measure and to temporarily restrict all entrants to the EU from South Africa.” said.
The dpa news agency also said, citing multiple diplomatic sources, that EU member states had reached an agreement to suspend passenger flights from seven African countries.
The target countries are known as South Africa, Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia and Zimbabwe.
Passengers arriving from the country are subject to strict quarantine and diagnostic tests, the source said.
The ’emergency brake’ measure is a measure that allows member countries to urgently and temporarily suspend all entry to residents of non-EU citizens of non-EU member countries when the situation of COVID-19 in non-EU member countries rapidly deteriorates and there is particularly concern about the spread of mutations. is.
The decision came hours after European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European Union’s administration, said he had proposed to member states to put in place “emergency brakes” on travel from southern Africa and other countries where the mutation was found. It came out after.
Commissioner von der Leyen said at a press conference that all flights to these countries should be suspended until the dangers of the new mutation are clear.
He added that travelers returning from these areas must follow strict quarantine rules.
[사진 출처 : 연합뉴스]
