Portugal questions 'logic' of move to amber list amid concerns over new Covid mutation

Portugal has queried the UK Government’s decision to remove it from the green travel list, as concerns were raised over a new Covid mutation found in the country. The popular tourist hotspot will be added to the amber list from 4am on Tuesday, meaning UK travellers should not visit the country and anyone returning must self-isolate for 10 days. But Portugal said it “cannot understand” the “logic” of the decision, with a Tweet sent from the account of the country’s Cabinet of Minister of State for Foreign Affairs reading: "Portugal continues to carry out its prudent and gradual deconfinement plan, with clear rules for the safety of those who live here and those who visit us." It comes as the travel industry reacted to the news with dismay. The decision to move Portugal to the amber list, including Madeira and the Azores, follows heightened concern about a mutation of the Delta variant first identified in India, the UK Government said. ‘Two things have really caused concern’ In an interview, Mr Shapps said: “I want to be straight with people, it’s actually a difficult decision to make, but in the end we’ve seen two things really which caused concern. “One is the positivity rate has nearly doubled since the last review in Portugal and the other is there’s a sort of Nepal mutation of the so-called Indian variant which has been detected and we just don’t know the potential for that to be vaccine-defeating mutation and simply don’t want to take the risk as we come up to June 21 and the review of the fourth stage of the unlock.” Afghanistan, Bahrain, Costa Rica, Sudan, and Trinidad and Tobago will also be placed on the red list, meaning people arriving in the UK from those nations will be required to stay in a quarantine hotel for 11 nights. People returning to the UK from red-list locations must stay in a quarantine hotel at a cost of £1,750 for solo travellers. No countries have been added to the green list, despite speculation that some Spanish and Greek islands, plus Malta, would be added. The news came on the same day the Government said a further 5,274 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus had been recorded in the UK as of 9am on Thursday, the highest single-day figure since March 26. ‘Another step back for the industry’ Andrew Flintham, the managing director of the TUI UK travel group, blasted the announcement as “another step back for our industry”. He said: “We were reassured that a green watch list would be created and a weeks’ notice would be given so travellers wouldn’t have to rush back home. They have failed on this promise.” Heathrow chief executive John Holland-Kaye added: “Ministers spent last month hailing the restart of international travel, only to close it down three weeks later all but guaranteeing another lost summer for the travel sector. “If the government is serious about protecting UK jobs and supporting businesses across the country, rapid action is needed to reopen flights to key trading partners, remove testing for vaccinated passengers from ‘green’ countries, and slash the cost and complexity of testing, as other G7 countries are doing.” Many holidaymakers in Portugal face a scramble for flights home before the new rules are introduced. Calls to scrap the amber list Labour criticised the “chaos” as reports about the restrictions dripped out of the government ahead of official confirmation and travel bosses said the move will cause “untold damage to customer confidence”. Shadow home secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds said: “The confusion over the ‘amber list’ has led to reports of over 50,000 people travelling to the UK daily, with only a tiny percentage going into hotel quarantine and a stream of flights entering the UK from ‘Amber List’ countries.” He went on: “Moving Portugal onto the ‘Amber List’ is not the answer. The ‘Amber List’ itself should be scrapped.” Portugal’s seven-day rate of coronavirus cases per 100,000 people stands at 37.2, up from 30.7 a week earlier. The announcement came as Public Health England said the Covid-19 variant that originated in India was now believed to be dominant in the UK, with early evidence suggesting it may lead to an increased risk of hospital admissions compared with the Kent variant. Dr Jeff Barrett, director of the Covid-19 Genomics Initiative at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, said the Nepal mutation (B.1.617.2 with an additional mutation: K417N) of the variant first detected in India (B.1.617.2), has also been observed in other variants including the one first identified in South Africa. He said it “is believed to be part of why that variant (South African) is less well neutralised by vaccines”. Dr Barrett added that because of this possibility and because the Indian variant appears more transmissible than the variant first detected in South Africa, scientists are monitoring it carefully. He explained this Indian variant plus the K417N mutation has been seen in numerous countries, including the UK, Portugal, the USA, India, Nepal and Japan.