June 3, 2020

expert comments about quarantine and border measures in relation to COVID-19

Priti Patel, the Home Secretary, has outlined details about quarantine and border measures in the UK in relation to COVID-19.

Dr Stephen Griffin, Associate Professor in the School of Medicine, University of Leeds, said:

“The UK currently has one of the highest numbers of recorded cases, and also the highest reported daily deaths attributed to SARS-COV2 in Europe.  Our world ranking is also amongst the highest in both categories.

“Quarantine is generally aimed at either preventing the earliest importation of cases, or to maintain low numbers after suppression of an outbreak.  The former did not occur, and we are not currently at an appropriate stage to effect the latter.

“I therefore question the timing of implementing such measures at present; by all means prepare, but if anything it would currently be more logical for many countries to refuse access to British travellers, than the other way around.”

Prof Keith Neal, Emeritus Professor of the Epidemiology of Infectious Diseases, University of Nottingham, said:

“PHE’s first few hundred cases preprint¹ clearly showed European travel was associated with many of the first cases and also with household contacts.  The highest number of cases probably returned after the half term week.  Italy did not realise the scale of their problem during that time and so it would have been impossible to have imposed quarantine on a country without evidence.  Everyone was looking at China.

“People who visit countries with less disease than the UK and maintain social distancing will be at lower risk than the UK.  On a Portuguese beach you are less at risk than a UK beach.  An air bridge between New Zealand and Australia could be agreed in an hour.  The only countries in which you could consider an air bridge are for the EU, Norway, Switzerland and Australasia.  You also need to trust the countries figures.”

1 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.18.20086157v1

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/public-health-border-measures-to-come-into-force-next-week

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