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Covid-19: No mandatory institutional quarantine for UK returnees in Delhi
The Delhi government on Saturday relaxed the provision of mandatory one-week institutional quarantine for the all the United Kingdom (UK) returnees who test negative for COVID-19. According to the new guidelines, travellers coming from the UK to the national capital will not have to undergo a seven-day institutional and seven-day home quarantine.
An official order on January 29 released by Delhi Chief Secretary Vijay Dev said, "The situation has now been reviewed and considering low positivity rate of UK returnees, it has been decided that the additional measure of compulsory institutional quarantine of travellers testing negative may not be furthermore and the Delhi government may align with Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) issued by the Government of India from time-to-time in this regard."
The Chief Secretary has directed the authorities to ensure strict compliance of the SOP issued by the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
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On December 23, the Central government suspended flights from the UK with all passengers coming from there having to be tested on arrival at airports- after the outbreak of a new coronavirus strain. According to the experts, the new coronavirus strain which was found in the UK is much more infectious than the previous one.
In order to stop the spread of the new coronavirus strain, the Delhi government, on January 8 had ordered mandatory institutional quarantine for United Kingdom travellers for a period of seven days in view of the new variant of Covid-19 detected in the UK.
Speaking to the media, the Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had said on January 8, "To protect Delhiites from exposure to the virus from the UK, the Delhi government has taken important decisions. Travellers coming from the UK will have to mandatorily undergo a self-paid Reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test on arrival at the airport. All those arriving from the UK who test positive will be isolated at an isolation facility. Negative ones will be taken to a quarantine facility for seven days, followed by seven days of home quarantine."
According to the reports, many passengers who returned from the United Kingdom between November 25 to December 22, when the government had banned all the flights to the country, were found positive during door to door testing undertaken by district surveillance teams in Delhi.
The new Covid-19 variant was first detected in Kent (UK) in September. The new variant has emerged with an unusually large number of mutations and is now the most common form of the coronavirus in England and Northern Ireland. The variant has also spread to more than 50 other countries.
According to the experts, the new strain of Covid-19 is thought to be up to 70 per cent more transmissible than the previous ones.
Vaccines are here but the fight against novel coronavirus is still on. On Saturday, India recorded over 13,000 fresh Covid-19 cases for the second day running. The day's death toll from the virus remained at 129.