England will be expanding the list of countries from which it recognises vaccinations starting 4 October, after the success of a pilot with the United States and Europe. Qatar is included in the list and travellers have to be fully vaccinated for at least 14 days with a full course of the Oxford/AstraZeneca, Pfizer BioNTech, Moderna or Janssen vaccines from a relevant public health body.

Great news - England will recognise Qatar-administered vaccines starting from 4 October. This means that most travellers from Qatar will no longer need to quarantine on arrival in England.

Please follow our travel advice [https://t.co/Bu0gukWpY9] for more details. pic.twitter.com/QSF7XM0wa1

— Jon Wilks (@JonWilksFCDO) September 17, 2021

Transport Secretary, Grant Shapps, has today (17 September 2021) announced a simplified system for international travel in light of the success of the UK’s domestic vaccine rollout, providing greater stability for industry and passengers.

The current traffic light system will be replaced by a single red list of countries and territories which will continue to be crucial in order to protect public health, and simplified travel measures for arrivals from the rest of the world from Monday 4 October at 4am.

Testing requirements will also be reduced for eligible fully vaccinated travellers, who will no longer need to take a PDT when travelling to England from Monday 4 October 4am.

From the end of October, eligible fully vaccinated passengers and those with an approved vaccine from a select group of non-red countries will be able to replace their day 2 test with a cheaper lateral flow test, reducing the cost of tests on arrival into England. The government wants to introduce this by the end of October, aiming to have it in place for when people return from half-term breaks.

Anyone testing positive will need to isolate and take a confirmatory PCR test, at no additional cost to the traveller, which would be genomically sequenced to help identify new variants.

Testing for unvaccinated passengers from non-red countries will include pre-departure tests, day 2 and day 8 PCR tests. Test to release remains an option to reduce self-isolation period.

From 4 October, England will welcome fully vaccinated travellers from a host of new countries – who will be treated like returning fully vaccinated UK travellers – including 17 countries and territories such as Japan and Singapore, following the success of an existing pilot with the US and Europe.

RELATED: No more hotel quarantine for those travelling from Qatar to England from 8 August 2021

Cover Editorial credit: Yau Ming Low / Shutterstock.com

Source: https://www.gov.uk/

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