Αssociated Press reports from Brussels that the European Union recommended Monday that its 27 nations reinstate restrictions on tourists from the U.S. because of rising coronavirus infections there.
The decision by the European Council to remove the U.S. from a safe list of countries for nonessential travel reverses advice that it gave in June when the bloc recommended lifting restrictions on U.S. travelers before the summer tourism season.
The guidance is nonbinding, however, and U.S. travelers should expect a mishmash of travel rules across the continent.
The EU also removed Israel, Kosovo, Lebanon, Montenegro, and North Macedonia from the list.
The EU has no unified COVID-19 tourism policy and national EU governments have the authority to decide whether they keep their borders open to U.S. tourists. Possible restrictions could include quarantines, further testing requirements upon arrival, or even a total ban on all nonessential travel from the U.S.
More than 15 million Americans a year visited Europe before the coronavirus crisis, and new travel restrictions could cost Europe billions.
The recommendation doesn’t apply to Britain, which formally left the EU at the beginning of the year and opened its borders to fully vaccinated travelers from the U.S. earlier this month.
The United States remains on Britain’s “amber” travel list, meaning that fully vaccinated adults arriving from the U.S. to the U.K. don’t have to self-isolate. A COVID-19 test is required three days before arrival in the U.K. and another test is needed two days after arriving.
Meanwhile, the United States has yet to reopen its own borders to EU tourists, despite calls from the bloc for the Biden administration to lift its ban.
Read more at thenationalherald.com
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