NPHET concerned about new cases arising from travel

The likelihood is that we will be living with Covid for the next few years, at least. Given that we will need to open up our economy and reopen our country to tourists so the priority should be to have fast and effective testing for people arriving here.
 
You can make strong case for mandatory quarantine for people arriving from the US and other countries outside Europe like India, Malaysia, Pakistan, Russia etc. You can even make case for the UK but that is next to impossible. However, when you look at infection rates in Countries like Germany, Greece, Norway, Denmark Italy and France, it becomes much more difficult to justify why someone travelling from places like them is riskier than people from somewhere like Dublin converging on a holiday location like Lahinch or Killarney for the weekend. People from abroad know how to adhere to social distance and take other precautions just like the rest of us. Not like we managed to deal with this virus any better than most European Countries.
 
Sunny said:
You can make strong case for mandatory quarantine for people arriving from the US and other countries outside Europe like India, Malaysia, Pakistan, Russia etc. You can even make case for the UK but that is next to impossible. However, when you look at infection rates in Countries like Germany, Greece, Norway, Denmark Italy and France, it becomes much more difficult to justify why someone travelling from places like them is riskier than people from somewhere like Dublin converging on a holiday location like Lahinch or Killarney for the weekend. People from abroad know how to adhere to social distance and take other precautions just like the rest of us. Not like we managed to deal with this virus any better than most European Countries.
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The risk is in the multiplication of the numbers. Any of those places, including Ireland, can have mini outbreaks - Germany locked down a region recently. The wider you cast the net - even for the same risk - the more likely you are to hit it. When you add in the circulation of travel, that's how it can kick off again. You are buying more lotto tickets.
If we are going to open up to tourism, then it becomes even more important to actually enforce the social distancing restrictions in pubs, hotels, restaurants, with actual penalties. Focus the monitoring on tourist heavy locations.
 
Discussing all international travel as one is misleading and is being used to deter Irish people from going abroad when incoming travellers may be a higher risk to the country.

On RTE website today acting Chief Medical Officer Dr Ronan Glynn was quoted saying...
"Countries from which people returned and subsequently tested positive - since the beginning of June - include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, France, Germany, India, Iraq, Malaysia, Pakistan, Portugal, Qatar, Sudan, Sweden, Ukraine, the UAE, UK and the United States,"

While strictly travel related without a doubt, how many are tourism related or related to journeys originating in Ireland? These must be mostly cases of returning expats as well as tourism originating in some of these countries. If these countries were closed to inward travel from Ireland and elsewhere how can people have returned from there since June unless they were already there pre-lockdown.
 
Also the UK, France , Germany and US are vitally important countries for the Irish economy the others are not, therefore even though some infections have originated from these countries, the importance to the Irish economy far outweighs the infection risk. Therefore a differentiated response based on country of origin should be implemented.
 
joe sod said:
America is much more important to the Irish economy than it is for any other European country, we will still need an economy when corona virus is finished.
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So your implying that we should let tourists in from a country that has one of the biggest number of cases in the world ? And that the yanks won't understand our reasons for closing the borders to them during these times ?
 
joe sod said:
Also the UK, France , Germany and US are vitally important countries for the Irish economy the others are not, therefore even though some infections have originated from these countries, the importance to the Irish economy far outweighs the infection risk. Therefore a differentiated response based on country of origin should be implemented.
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Do you also mean that this importance to the economy outweighs peoples lives ?
 
Unfortunately you have those travellers who don't care about anybody but themselves. A lot of Americans cannot see that they have lost a huge amount of respect that was once there for them.
 
Drakon said:
No, that is true. The volume of flight are down by 92% though. And not all air passengers are tourists. But all air passengers all meant to self-isolate for two weeks.


FWIW, Simon Coveney says that international travellers pose the greatest C19 risk.
Ultimately, I don’t care. COVID-19 won’t kill me or my family. But for the health of the nation..
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Drakon,
That's a big statement to make about a virus we still don't know enough about. Have you seen the research from Italy which has shown that even people who had asymptomatic or mild infections have organ damage? They believe now that it is a systemic infection, affecting all of the major organs and not just the respiratory system. We don't know the long term affects of this yet. I will certainly be doing my best to not get it and protect the more vulnerable people in my life.
 
Thanks leo, can you explain how the government compiled the list of 15 countries?
 
horse7 said:
Thanks leo, can you explain how the government compiled the list of 15 countries?
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The list is based on an assessment of risk of any one travelling from Ireland to those countries contracting the virus and bringing it back with them.
 
So,am I wrong in assuming that as we have a 5 per 100,000 cases of infection, that other countries with a similar or lower rate of infection, should be on the list?
 
Health Minister Stephen Donnelly has said that random testing at Irish airports is to be introduced amid a “volatile” situation abroad.
Donnelly said this action would go in tandem with “an increased public health presence” ant entry points in the country...

Speaking about the situation globally, Donnelly said that it was “becoming more volatile” and that Ireland is to begin random testing at airports.
“We’re introducing random testing at the airports and an increased public health presence. And we’re examining other options as well for further restrictions on non-essential travel because as you rightly say this the international situation is becoming more volatile,” he said.

www.thejournal.ie

Health Minister says random testing at airports is to be introduced

Stephen Donnelly refused to be drawn on the impending decision on whether to allow pubs to reopen.
www.thejournal.ie www.thejournal.ie
 
5 day average as reported yesterday is 45 new cases per day, only 8-10 of cases identified over the last two weeks have been associated with foreign travel.
 
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