What you need to know before traveling to Eastern Europe this Christmas

Advice on international travel during the Christmas period has been confusing for many.

Despite the reduced Covid-19 restrictions, the National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) has urged people to avoid all non-essential travel, while the government has said it is up to the individual to determine what. they consider essential.

For many Irish living abroad, the decision to return home for Christmas is a difficult one, but that decision is also faced by thousands of people who came here from abroad.

According to the latest census of 2016, people from Central and Eastern European countries made up a large percentage of the Republic’s non-Irish national population.

Poland had the highest number of people from these areas residing in Ireland, with 122,515 entering their nationality as Polish in the last census, followed by Lithuania (36,552), Romania (29,186) and Latvia (19,933).

Slovakia and Hungary each have more than 9,000 citizens residing in Ireland, while Croatia and the Czech Republic have figures in the region of 5,000.

Just as the second wave of the virus increased the number of cases in Ireland, countries on the continent felt similar, if not more intense pain.

According to the European Center for Disease Control and Prevention (ECDC), Poland currently has an incidence rate of 14 days per 100,000 of 396.6, while Lithuania is more than triple that of 1,205.9.

Although the EU traffic light system was established to help revive the aviation sector, in practice, there is little it could do to improve travel opportunities as virus transmission worsened once again in Europe.

Currently, all regions of the Republic of Ireland are classified as orange, while most of continental Europe remains red.

Thirty European countries are included in the traffic light system, including Poland, Lithuania, Romania, Latvia and Slovakia. The full list of countries can be viewed here.

Limit movements

For people thinking of traveling home for Christmas, Ireland’s orange status would allow them to travel to countries enrolled in the system without the need to self-quarantine upon arrival if they provide a negative Covid-19 test, taken no more three days before your arrival. enter the country.

For the return leg of your trip, if you are coming from a red or gray region, you will be asked to limit your movements for 14 days when you return to Ireland.

However, they can get a PCR test five days after your arrival, allowing them to stop limiting your movements if you test negative. For those coming from the orange areas, the process is the same as for the first leg of their journey from Ireland.

The status of each country under the traffic light system is being monitored and updated using data from the ECDC. Updated statuses can be found here.

Passengers are reminded that they must comply with the public health guidelines of the country they are traveling to and that they should seek information from the relevant authorities in the country prior to arrival.