- Cyprus and Lithuania removed from list of travel corridors for the UK following data showing a significant increase in confirmed cases
- no countries added to list of travel corridors this week
- travellers urged to check the latest advice from the FCDO before travelling and will be required to fill in a passenger locator form before returning home
People arriving into the UK from Cyprus and Lithuania from 4am Sunday 1 November 2020 will need to self-isolate for 2 weeks as the countries are removed from the travel exemptions list.
Data from the Joint Biosecurity Centre and Public Health England has indicated a significant change in both the level and pace of confirmed cases of coronavirus (COVID-19) in both destinations, leading to ministers removing these from the current list of travel corridors.
A range of factors are taken into account when deciding to remove a country from the exemption list, including the continued increase of coronavirus within a country, the numbers of new cases, information on a country's testing capacity, testing regime and test positivity rate and potential trajectory of the disease in the coming weeks.
There has been a consistent increase in COVID-19 cases per 100,000 of the population in Cyprus over the last 2 weeks, with a 79% increase in total cases over this time period. In Lithuania, new cases per week have increased by 47% over the same time period.
At the same time, the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) has also updated its travel advice to advise against all but essential travel to Cyprus and Lithuania. These changes reflect the latest assessments by Public Health England of the risk to travellers in each of these destinations.
The government has made consistently clear it will take decisive action if necessary to contain the virus, including removing countries from the travel corridors list rapidly if the public health risk of people returning from a particular country without self-isolating becomes too high.
People currently in Cyprus and Lithuania are encouraged to follow the local rules and check the FCDO travel advice pages for
