London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Tuesday, Oct 07, 2025

UK’s Covid travel restrictions to be dropped despite rise in cases

UK’s Covid travel restrictions to be dropped despite rise in cases

Remaining rules including mandatory passenger locator forms and tests for unvaccinated arrivals will end Friday
All remaining Covid travel restrictions are to be dropped across the UK from later this week, despite a concerning rise in cases and hospitalisations.

Ministers approved the scrapping of passenger locator forms and the requirement for all unvaccinated arrivals to get tested, with the changes to come into force from 4am on Friday.

Quarantine hotels, which have not been used since the “red list” of countries was emptied in December but have been kept on standby, will also be fully stood down from the end of March.

Tory MPs and the aviation industry had put pressure on the government to make the move before April, given all domestic restrictions have already been repealed.

Announcing the change, the transport secretary, Grant Shapps, said on Monday it would “mean greater freedom for travellers ahead of the Easter holidays”.

The decision will be welcomed by the travel industry. On Monday, Heathrow announced that air passengers travelling through the airport will no longer be required to wear a mask from Wednesday. British Airways and Virgin Atlantic said they were also preparing to drop the requirement onboard, when flying to destinations that do not require face coverings on planes.

Heathrow said it would still strongly encourage people to continue to wear masks at the airport, in recognition that the pandemic was not over, but it would no longer be a firm requirement – mirroring the practice around UK transport.

BA and Virgin said rules would depend on the destinations with masks required on many routes, including to the US until at least 18 April. Virgin flights to the Caribbean from both Heathrow and Manchester will see optional mask-wearing.

It comes as Britain’s Covid situation deteriorated further, with health officials concerned that the number of people being hospitalised with the virus was also growing at a fast rate.

In the past week, 444,201 positive cases have been recorded – an increase of 48.1%. The number of patients admitted to hospital has also risen steeply to 10,576 in England as of 8am on 14 March – 19% up on the previous week.

Boris Johnson’s spokesperson on Monday insisted there was no need for any fresh restrictions to help curb the spread of the virus.
Advertisement

He said the prime minister was “keeping a close eye on the data” but that “at the moment, we don’t see anything nearing any of the sorts of pressures we saw at the peak of the pandemic, when such large proportions of the population weren’t vaccinated or boosted”.

He added: “We obviously will always have contingency plans, but the prime minister and others have talked about how the vaccination and our therapeutics mean we will not need to return to the lockdowns of the past that saw such significant measures be necessary.”

The health secretary, Sajid Javid, also said the UK was in a “very good position” given the take-up of vaccines, and that a rise in infection rates was to be expected.

In a bid to appease those concerned about the dropping of border measures, he vowed: “We will continue monitoring and tracking potential new variants, and keep a reserve of measures which can be rapidly deployed if needed to keep us safe.”

The Department for Transport said that the “default approach will be to use the least stringent measures” and that contingency measures “will only be implemented in extreme circumstances”.

Last month, Johnson significantly loosened remaining Covid restrictions, announcing that those with the virus were no longer required to isolate and that free mass testing would end from 1 April.

Self-isolation support payments were also jettisoned, while sick pay rules reverted to less generous pre-pandemic arrangements.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
×