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LAST UPDATE | 26 Nov 2021
PEOPLE TRAVELLING TO Ireland from seven southern African nations will have to get a pre-flight PCR test to fly into Ireland, and take part in 10-day mandatory quarantine ‘at home’, which will end if they receive two negative PCR tests.
These rules apply regardless of vaccination status.
Speaking on RTÉ’s Six One News this evening, Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly said: “The advice for our residents who are in the seven countries is to return as soon as possible and to comply with new public-health protection measures we have here.
“Probably the most important of those are a pre-flight PCR, regardless of your vaccine status, and when you come back, mandatory home quarantine with two PCR tests. The home quarantine would be for 10 days, assuming the second test is not detected.”
Gardaí are to police the mandatory home quarantine, he said.
The Government is also considering reintroducing Mandatory Hotel Quarantine, and will introduce legislation to the Dáil next week in case that system needs to be reintroduced.
Ireland doesn’t have any direct flights to the seven nations affected by the travel restrictions: Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, and Zimbabwe.
The Department of Foreign Affairs has also changed its travel advisory to “avoid non-essential travel” to these countries.
No cases of this new variant have been detected in Ireland yet; Donnelly said genome sequencing of Covid-19 cases linked to these countries will now commence.
This evening, the World Health Organisation officially designated the latest strain of Covid-19 as a “variant of concern”, naming it the Omicron variant.
Earlier today, the EU told member states that they should suspend all air travel between their nations and countries that have been linked to the new Covid-19 variant.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen says EU countries should restrict travel from southern African countries and that any travellers from those countries should be quarantined.
“It is now important that all of us in Europe act very swiftly, decisively and united,” von der Leyen said in a briefing.
“The European Commission has proposed to member states to activate the emergency brake on travel from countries in southern Africa and other countries affected to limit the spread of the new variant,” she said.
Belgium has become the first European country to announce a case of the variant, which scientists in South Africa formally identified yesterday evening.
The country’s Health Minister Frank Vandenbroucke told a media conference: “We have a case that is now confirmed of this variant.”
The Belgian case was confirmed in an unvaccinated person returning from abroad.
The infected person tested positive on 22 November and had not had Covid-19 before, the health minister said.
A leading Belgian virologist, Marc Van Ranst, tweeted that the person had returned from Egypt on 11 November.
“So, total precaution but don’t panic,” Vandebroucke said of Europe’s restrictions, adding that Belgium’s Covid-19 risk assessment group was analysing the situation.
The new variant is a concern, according to scientists, because of its high number of mutations and rapid spread among young people in Gauteng, South Africa’s most populous province.
The coronavirus evolves as it spreads and many new variants, including those with worrying mutations, often just die out.
Scientists are monitoring it for possible changes that it could be more transmissible or deadly, but sorting out whether new variants will have a public health impact can take time.
Currently identified as B.1.1.529, the new variant has also been found in Botswana and Hong Kong in travellers from South Africa.
A fourth wave of Covid-19 is hitting the 27-nation EU especially badly, with governments scrambling to tighten restrictions in an attempt to contain the spread.
Italy is banning visitors from southern Africa over the new variant, while Germany will ban most travel from South Africa and neighbouring nations except for German nationals.
Germany’s acting health minister Jens Spahn said they will need to quarantine for 14 days upon arrival even if they are vaccinated.
“The last thing we need now is an introduced new variant that causes even more problems,” he said.
Italy’s ban applies to people who have been in in South Africa, Lesotho, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Namibia or Swaziland in the past fortnight.
Austria, Czech Republic and the Netherlands followed suit in saying they would impose travel restrictions.
The bans all included South Africa and in many cases some or all of its neighbouring countries.
The UK has also announced that it is banning flights from South Africa and five other southern African countries from noon today and that anyone who had recently arrived from those countries would be asked to take a Covid-19 test.
Singapore and Malaysia said they would restrict arrivals from seven African countries.
Meanwhile, Israel has confirmed that it has identified a case of the variant in a person who returned from Malawi.
Two more cases were detected in in Israel in “people returning from abroad”, who were placed in quarantine.
The three people were all vaccinated, Israel’s health ministry said, without specifying the number of doses or the type of vaccine they had been given.
The United States announced that it is restricting travel from eight southern African countries from Monday: South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and Malawi – the latter of which is not on Ireland’s or the UK’s list.
There are currently four variants of concern: Alpha, Beta (which was first documented in South Africa), Gamma and the overwhelmingly dominant Delta.
There are also two variants of interest: Lambda and Mu.
With reporting by AFP and updated by Gráinne Ní Aodha and Lauren Boland.
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Just do it!
Take maximum measures ASAP…..
Donnelly will be breathing a huge sigh of relief as the EU steps in a makes a call, a call he had not the guts or competence to make himself.
@joe oneill: I knew there would be one!!!
The new variant is not even here yet and Donnelly is getting flak.
Sack them all, election now!!!!!
@Justin Gillespie:
They can’t wait to make this the Government problem..
There is no direct flights from Southern Africa and Ireland… That means we are reliant on other countries who have a direct flight to impose this ban… And ye it is right, if the UK get it, so do we…
This is because Northern Ireland doesn’t want to impose an all Island policy.. I would ask how Sinn Fein was willing to take down the government up there over a slight on the Irish language but have been generally mute about importing COVID infection continuously and thus not allowing us to get rid of the virus…
SF say they are an all Ireland party but won’t pull out the stops to protect all Ireland…
Dear Journal….just one day maybe leave off the usual barage of Covid stories….just one day, please! Queue the ‘you don’t have to read the articles’ responses.
@Hear me now: The new variant is big news, if the journal didn’t report it you’d have all the conspiracy nutters on here telling us to “wake up” or the usual moaners on here crying for lack of transparency.
@Hear me now: While I agree to a point, I think each article is newsworthy to some people and therefore that trumps your case. This morning I read all of the stories about the new variant because I have a lot of friends in SA who may be affected by flight cancellations etc. Normally I don’t read the articles but don’t mind reading the headlines
@HectorPickaxe: fair enough
@Alan Biddulph: true
@Hear me now: Weak.
@Hear me now: You don’t have to read the articles.
@JustMeHere: yes your response is very weak, have a nice day.
@Earth Traveller: Genius comment of the day…you have my pity!
New scariant variant. YAWN.
@Robert Clifford: Conspiracy theorist comment. Yawn.
@Lee King Buckett: Oh no it isn’t. It’s just panto season that’s all.
All doom and gloom again this morning with the Irish Media. Just another day in Ireland
@Maurice O Neill: Grow up and face reality. The world isn’t in a good state
@Maurice O Neill: Big news all across Europe
@Brendan Gordon: The world is the same at it’s always been, some good, some bad, some in between.
It’s the way of things
Bans won’t keep it out for long (if indeed it turns out to be as feared)
Vaccine, boosters and following hygiene & distancing advice are all we can do really. It is what it is and we can’t shout evolution away unfortunately.
@Lee King Buckett:
Keep out as long as possible… We need to see how it reacts to the vaccine… This variant is a long way from the Wuhan original and we are hoping they can still be effective.
Fewer than 6% of people in Africa are vaccinated. For months, the WHO has described Africa as “one of the least affected regions in the world” in its weekly pandemic reports.
WHO data show that deaths in Africa make up just 3% of the global total. In comparison, deaths in the Americas and Europe account for 46% and 29%.
A “variant” comes about, from the darkest depths of South Africa they (Israel) say.. So the western world goes into lockdown once again. Go figure.
WHO says there are “Variants of Concern” listed on their website. They do not illuminate the fact that there have been thousands of variants, but never mind. Just be worried about the variants that you’re told to worry about. Get the “jab”, which we can now call a “vaccine” since Merriam-Webster changed its definition earlier this year. But wait now, vaccines don’t work against other variants? Better sign up now for your bi-annual Pfizer subscription.
There is one thing exceptionally poignant about this whole affair. You can’t apply logic to politics. But then, you turn to politicians and their various arms for a solution? Look at it for what it is.
@cathalsurfs: Thousands of variants you say? Would have thought that would be fairly well reported on.
@cathalsurfs: The statistics coming out of Africa can’t be trusted as the health services in many countries are very poor compared to European or American standards and it is likely that numbers as being under reported as a result.
Of course there has been 1,000′s of variants it is the nature of virus to evolve rapidly, we are told to worry about certain variants because they could cause greater risk to health services and result in greater numbers of sick and death.
A vaccine causes your body to have an immune response and prepares the immune system to fight a virus/ bacteria infection. The new mRNA vaccines do this. Although they are shown to have reducing protection against infection this are still highly effective at preventing serious illness or death, in the region of 90%+.
@Chris Linehan: not 1,000s but about 1,600 to date I believe. Most of them were of little concern.
Variants of concern are named after the Greek alphabet and if B.1.1.529 turns out to be one it will be called Nu – that tells you how many concerning ones have been observed since Alpha
No need for boosters so if they aren’t effective against this “new” variant.
@a: Edgy use of punctuation there – you plandemic kids are way too cool for school really
@a: that’s a bit of a jump!
@a: You do know that the Delta variant is still here, right?
@a:
Why don’t you just give up right now…
Your posts everyday are about not fighting this virus… This is simply Ireland v COVID… Do you want us to give up because it is hard?
We tried that last Christmas and we can remember the misery it brought us after wards…
We cant use hotel quarantine because our law for it lapsed last month.. The government didnt think there would be any new variants of concern..
@Munster1: didnt work anyway
@Munster1: if only there was some mechanism the government could use to bring back that law or a new version or something….
They are acting very quickly on this, this new variant only made the news yesterday as far as I saw. We were told new variants would pop up and here we are. Hopefully these become more transmissible and less virulent.
@Bob Mac: thankfully they’re willing to take decisive action and not do the whole let’s wait and see approach.
Well that’s the curtain twitcher Simon Donnelly off the hook.
@joe oneill: A second shot at Stephen Donnelly in the one story Joe?
A bit excessive even for you.
I still can’t believe it’s not butter!!!!!
This is insanity. People wigging out over a variant that nobody knows anything about. Beggars belief.
@Robert Clifford: Robert you are glued to the Journal so you must be a glutton for hysteria.
@Robert Clifford: In fairness, there is still a lot unknown about this variant but given that it has a large number of mutations to the spike protein and the fact that it has become the dominant variant in the Guateng province and accelerated cases extremely quickly then I think it’s wise to be cautious at this point in time.
The new variant is less transmissible and less severe than the current delta variant so we should encourage it coming here…
@Roger Bond: That’s great news – can you send on your research and results to the WHO as soon as you’ve had a bit of breakfast – thanks for your quick work Mr Bond
@Lee King Buckett: it’s not my research..it’s freely available from the WHO website if you were bothered to check..
@Roger Bond: no it’s not, they haven’t assessed it yet at all.
If you can find a link to it then by all means please post.
@Roger Bond: eh no it’s not.. They haven’t labelled it yet.
@Roger Bond: the new variant is WAY more transmissable.
have your say