Covid-19 is ‘easily the most severe’ emergency declared by WHO, director says

The Balearic and Canary islands have been added to the UK’s list of areas where all non-essential travel should be avoided, the British government has said.

The move comes after Downing Street warned that "no travel is risk-free" during the Covid-19 pandemic, after a coronavirus quarantine requirement for people arriving in the UK from mainland Spain was reintroduced over the weekend.

It also comes on the same day the director general of the World Health Organisation (WHO) said the novel coronavirus was “easily the most severe” global health emergency his organisation has declared.

The UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) on Monday updated its travel advice for visits to Spain, saying: “The FCO advise against all non-essential travel to Spain, including the Balearic and Canary islands, based on the current assessment of Covid-19 risks in the country.”

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An FCO spokesman said: “We have considered the overall situation for British nationals travelling to and from the Balearic and Canary islands, including the impact of the requirement to self-isolate on return to the UK, and concluded that we should advise British nationals against all non-essential travel to the whole of Spain.”

The announcement came after British prime minister Boris Johnson’s official spokesman said decisions on border measures and travel advice “can be changed rapidly if necessary to help stop the spread of the disease.

“Unfortunately no travel is risk-free during this pandemic and disruption is possible and so anyone travelling abroad should be aware that our travel advice and exemption list is under constant review as we monitor the international situation.”

The decision comes after the Spanish government said it was in talks with the UK about excluding the Balearic and Canary islands from the UK’s quarantine measures.

But health minister Lord Bethell said: "Within individual countries there is no way for us to control intra-country transport; it is therefore very difficult and challenging to have a regional exemption list, and that is why we've not been able to give exemptions to the Balearics."

‘Most severe’

The latest news from the UK came after the director general of the WHO, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, told a press briefing that the novel coronavirus was “easily the most severe” global health emergency his organisation has declared.

The WHO director general said that the pandemic “continues to accelerate”. “In the past six weeks, the total number of cases has roughly doubled,” he told the press briefing in Geneva on Monday.

He added: “Covid-19 has changed our world. It has brought people, communities and nations together, and driven them apart. It has shown what humans are capable of – both positively and negatively.

“We have learned an enormous amount, and we’re still learning.”

More than 16.35 million people have been reported to have been infected by Covid-19 globally, and 649,225 people have died from the disease, according to a Reuters tally. – PA/Reuters