Turkey’s health minister has confirmed that the authorities have quarantined thousands of airline passengers who arrived from the UK on and after December 14 as a new Covid strain sees Britain increasingly isolated.
In a tweet on Tuesday morning, Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said that 4,603 people had been identified as entering the country from the UK since December 14 and were being made to isolate.
“As of December 14, all passengers arriving from England have been identified. The information of 4,603 passengers was transferred to the system and they were isolated in their residences and hotels,” Koca wrote.
“PCR tests of these passengers are carried out under the coordination of our General Directorate of Public Health,” he added.
The move to isolate all people entering Turkey from the UK comes after the authorities decided to suspend all flights from Britain as of December 20.
Koca said that all 335 people who arrived in the country the night before the travel ban came into force had been tested for Covid-19. Even those who tested negative would be required to isolate and will be tested again after seven days.
Turkey’s decision to quarantine more than 4,600 airline passengers comes as nations around the world close their borders to Britons.
A new strain of Covid-19, identified in the UK, is reportedly 70 percent more contagious and has been linked to soaring cases across Britain.
Fear that the virus strain, which has been present in the UK since September, could reach other nations has seen the international community introduce widespread travel bans on Britons.
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