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Families hoping to reunite at Christmas have taken a hit amid a new warning about international travel safety.
Medical director Tony Holohan told a government committee that traveling for non-essential reasons “is not safe” and that returning home at Christmas would not be considered an essential reason.
He ruled out a situation in which people returning home to visit relatives in late December could be classified as “essential” travel, as he answered questions about the feasibility of international travel between now and Christmas.
Dr Holohan said: “The situation at the moment is that international travel of a non-essential nature is not safe.
“The movement of populations around areas with high experience of this disease, particularly Europe and North America, within and outside this country is not safe.”
The advice for that period could change, as it “relates to a host of factors that are unknown at this time,” Dr. Holohan said.
Christmas flights
Ireland will adopt a new EU traffic light system for international travel on November 8.
This will see countries designated as green, orange, or red, with additional restrictions like testing and quarantine required for people arriving from orange and red countries.
“If I had to guess, I’d say there won’t be many countries in the green when it comes to Christmas flights,” said Dr. Holohan.
“The vast majority of countries are red and they are getting more and more red. That is the current situation. That is why we are concerned about international travel. “
For now, that advice is: If you’re thinking about nonessential travel, don’t do it.
“Comparing our experience with that of Europe is that the level of disease transmission in this country is improving, at a point where the vast majority of countries in Europe are improving,” he added.
“We just have to take that into account in terms of our public health advice for people who are making plans to travel.”
However, Dr Holohan was “optimistic” that Ireland could ease some of the current Level 5 restrictions as planned on December 1.
“At the moment that advice is: if you’re thinking about nonessential travel, don’t do it,” he added.
“That is very clear, we are advising against non-essential travel for public health reasons. If we think that can change, we will make that advice available. “
advice
It comes as the National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) has warned that international travelers must restrict their movement for five to seven days if tests are introduced on flights.
A symptom check and test should also be done on the fifth day of that period, Nphet told the Oireachtas transportation committee.
This would be the “most effective method to contain the importation of the virus”, but could still miss up to 15 percent of imported cases.
Dr Cillian De Gascun, director of the National Virus Reference Laboratory at University College Dublin, expressed reservations about the use of rapid antigen tests at airports, saying their sensitivity rate was only 80 percent.
“One in five cases will be lost, and that is not enough,” he told the committee.
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