[News] Peru suspends flights from Europe due to new strain of COVID-19 detected in the United Kingdom

[#Steeven.™]

The Government of Peru "preventively" suspended flights from Europe for two weeks due to the appearance in the United Kingdom of a new variant of COVID-19, reported the Peruvian president, Francisco Sagasti.

The president pointed out, in a message offered this Monday on television, that "the alarm in Europe and other regions" also affects Peru and stressed that the WHO has asked the member states to "reinforce their control and prevention procedures."

For this reason, he indicated, Peru has decided to suspend the entry of flights from Europe for the next two weeks and "to prohibit the entry of non-resident foreigners who have been in the United Kingdom in the last two weeks."

As reported on Sunday by the Ministries of Transport and Communications (MTC) and of Health (Minsa), Sagasti reiterated that "for the tranquility of all" Peruvians who to their country "have not entered any direct flight from the United Kingdom since the country's air borders reopened ", on October 15.

He added that passengers who have arrived on connecting flights in the UK "are being monitored by the Ministry of Health"

The ruler also recalled that "no passenger coming from abroad can enter Peru if he does not present the negative result of a molecular test, in strict compliance with the established health protocols."

Sagasti said that, despite this, measures "aimed at preventing the appearance of the new variant" of covid-19 in the country have been adopted, which also include Peruvian citizens or resident foreigners who are already in Peru and have visited the UK in the last two weeks "they will have to quarantine for 14 days".

In addition, the Epidemiological Surveillance System has been declared "in a state of maximum alert."

Peru reached 997,517 total cases and 37,103 deaths from COVID-19 this Sunday, after adding another 500 infected and 69 deaths in the last 24 hours, according to the latest Minsa report.