Mumbai: Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Friday that Britain was looking at ways to “help and support” India, as it copes with the second devastating wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We’re looking at what we can do to help and support the people of India,” Johnson told reporters while on a visit to Derbyshire on a local elections campaign trail.
It is believed that this support may be in the form of a ventilator or therapeutic.
Johnson’s comment, which was forced to cancel a planned trip to India this weekend that came amid an increase in infections, on Friday as a ‘Red List’ COVID-19 travel ban in India on Friday, which bans entry for travellers from India and requires British and Irish nationals and long-term UK residents returning home to undergo a compulsory 10-day hotel quarantine.
Public Health England (PHE) confirmed 55 more cases of the so-called double mutant Indian version B.1.617, with all coronovirus cases being tracked with total warrants under investigation until 14 April, taking the total for the Variant Under Investigation (VUI) in the UK to 132.
Earlier, Heathrow confirmed that it had turned down requests for at least eight additional flights, seeking landing rights at 4 am Friday to avoid long queues and congestion at the airport.
Families and students who were able to make it back in time will now have to self-segregate into their own homes or register student accommodation on passenger locator forms and follow up coronavirus tests for the National Health Service (NHS) to continue tracking their results.
Anyone arriving on Friday from India will have to budget for a 10-day quarantine period at a government-approved hotel quarantine facility and follow PCR tests by adding around £ 2,000 per person to travel costs.
Indian students are most affected by this additional requirement as they were preparing to resume their on-campus studies at UK universities or to start a new term every month.
Meanwhile, some UK universities are also reaching out to the government to offer assistance in the quarantine process on campus to help support some of these foreign students.
Universities UK International (UUKI), a representative group of leading UK universities, has said that while the government may have difficulty providing capacity, they should look into where universities have accommodations that can meet the standard of the hotel quarantine system.
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