Monday, June 29, 2020

FEW CHANGES AS CYPRUS TWEAKS GROUPS A AND B COUNTRIES

in-cyprus 29 June 2020 -ByBouli Hadjioannou




The Health Ministry on Monday issued a revised list of countries regarding their epidemiological risk as regards coronavirus for travel purposes, making only minor changes.

Japan was added to Group A and Serbia to Group B. Bulgaria was moved to Group B from A, as had been announced from last week.

Passengers from Group A are not required to present a certificate they have undergone a coronavirus test.

Those from Group B will have to present such a certificate from a recognised lab no older than 72 hours prior to departure. However, passengers who cannot obtain such a certificate in the country of residence will have the option to carry out a test on arrival and cover the cost of 60 euro.

About 300 random tests will also be carried out every day among passengers from both groups of countries.

Only Cypriots and legal residents are allowed to come to Cyprus from countries that are not on either list.

Classifications are based on the reproduction rate R (t)  for Covid-19, the number of new cases, the number of tests, the mortality rate per 100,000 people, the estimated prevalence and WHO indicators.

Classification of countries based on epidemiological risk is exceptionally dynamic and can change at any given moment as the pandemic develops, the ministry said.

For this reason, new data will be announced and the list will be regularly updated, it added

The countries have been classified as follows:

Group A – Low risk countries

These are countries with R (t) of below 1 and/or small number of new cases (<1/100,000 inhabitants a day)  and/or very low COVID19 mortality  (<5-10/100,000 inhabitants) and/or sporadic cases or cluster of cases according to WHO and /or at least satisfactory tests (>3000 tests/100,000 residents):

  • Australia
  • Austria
  • Croatia
  • Czechia
  • Denmark
  • Estonia
  • Finland
  • Germany
  • Greece
  • Switzerland
  • Japan
  • Hungary
  • Iceland
  • Latvia
  • Liechtenstein
  • Lithuania
  • Luxembourg
  • Malta
  • Norway
  • Slovakia
  • Slovenia
  • South Korea

Group B – Countries with  possible low risk but with greater doubts compared to Group A 

These are countries with R (t) above 1 and/or new cases of  >1/100,000 people a day and/or increased COVID-19 mortality (>10/100,000 people)  and/or limited lab tests  (<2000 tests/100,000 people) or lack of classification by WHO.

  • Bulgaria
  • Belgium
  • France
  • Ireland
  • Israel
  • Italy
  • Lebanon
  • Jordan
  • Netherlands
  • Spain
  • Poland
  • Romania
  • Serbia
  • UAE