Ireland’s Europe Minister Thomas Byrne has said that the EU’s new traffic light system for international travel will be “moot” unless Ireland eases the strict Level 3 restrictions.
However, he did add that the new system will offer a framework for how air travel will work when Covid-19 levels here improve.
The aim of the new traffic light system is to get rid of the 14 quarantine measures for passengers coming from green and orange countries – those that have lower rates of Covid-19.
Mr Byrne said: “While we’re in Level 3 and we’re told to stay within our own counties a lot of it is moot, but at least it’ll be there whenever things change.”
Ireland’s Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said that Ireland would implement the new traffic light plan, however he could not say when a Covid-19 testing regime would be in place in airports – to test passengers arriving from countries with higher levels of Covid-19.
Mr Donnelly said that one option currently being explored was for travellers coming from countries with high Covid-19 rates to take a test at their point of origin, before travel.
