The Times 23 March - article by Ben Ellery
Direct flights from coronavirus hotspots including Italy are still scheduled to arrive in Britain
JASON MITCHELL/ALAMY
Flights carrying thousands of passengers from coronavirus hotspots are still landing in Britain.
Passengers from Italy, China, Iran and Spain continue to arrive at Gatwick and Heathrow as the Home Office has allowed planes to carry on flying.
Planes arrived in London from Rome, Beijing and Shanghai every day last week. Direct flights from Rome are still due to arrive this week despite British Airways, Easyjet and Ryanair having cancelled all flights between Italy and Britain.
The number of deaths from coronavirus in Italy has overtaken those in China. Spain has the second highest number of cases in Europe but British Airways and Iberia flights from Madrid and Barcelona landed at Heathrow yesterday. A flight from Tehran also arrived at Heathrow in the afternoon.
Theresa Villiers, a former cabinet minister, raised the Tehran flights with the government after she was alerted by constituents of Iranian descent. “The time has come to suspend routine air travel from Iran,” she told The Sunday Times.
The Foreign Office advised Britons last week not to travel anywhere abroad unless it was essential.
A government spokesman said: “There is no evidence that interventions like closing borders or travel bans would have any effect on the spread of infection. Those who return to the UK would be advised to reduce their social contact by following the same social distancing measures as the rest of the country.”
On Twitter a user called Fayaz addressed Heathrow and Gatwick, saying: “Could you please tell me why you are still accepting flights from Italy Iran China when most EU airports have locked off flights? This is disturbing news the UK is still open for business.”
Poppy Wingate tweeted: “Today I arrived at Heathrow Airport after flying from Sri Lanka (lay over in Dubai). After passing through three major airports . . . I am disgusted to have walked freely out of Heathrow airport. NO CHECKS were done whatsoever today . . . passport control didn’t even ask where I had flown in from.”
Heathrow said Ms Wingate could log a complaint with Public Health England, which is directing checks at airports.
Another person tweeted: “Boris Johnson should be closing Heathrow, daily there are hundreds of people queueing at UK border shoulder to shoulder, where’s the social distancing? These are integrating and super- spreading. ACT NOW.”
Emirates Airlines said yesterday that it would suspend all passenger flights by Wednesday, only to reverse the decision late last night after “requests from governments and customers to support the repatriation of travellers”. However, the airline said that it would reduce its routes from 159 destinations to 13: the UK, Switzerland, Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Australia, South Africa, the US and Canada.
Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed al-Maktoum, chief executive of the airline, said: “This is an unprecedented crisis situation in terms of breadth and scale: geographically, as well as from a health, social and economic standpoint.”
