The government of the United Kingdom on Friday announced that it has removed Egypt, Kenya and six other countries from its travel “Red List”.
Egypt will move to the amber list for entering England from 4:00 am on Wednesday, September 22, meaning that there will no longer be a self-financed, 10-day mandated hotel quarantine for those travelling from Egypt to England.
Other countries removed from the “Red List” are Maldives, Turkey, Sri Lanka, Oman, Bangladesh and Pakistan.
The decision is part of a series of changes that will see the current system of restrictions abolished and new regulations introduced from October which will focus on vaccination status.
The “Red List” restricts travellers coming from those countries from entering the UK over the Covid-19 pandemic.
Egypt was initially placed on the UK’s ‘red list’ on 8 June, with the justification that the country’s “COVID-19 prevalence is assessed to be high and there is evidence to suggest community transmission of variants of concern.”
Egypt’s status on the ‘red list’ caused a financial strain on those who had to travel to the UK from Egypt with the UK government charging up to GBP 2285 (approximately EGP 50,000), but it had also begun to affect Egypt’s economy as a whole.
In August, the World Travel Tourism Council (WTTC) revealed that the situation was posing a serious threat to the country’s travel and tourism sector, highlighting that the economy could face daily losses of more than EGP 31 million if it continued to be on the ‘red list.’
The British market is a key source of tourists to Egypt. It came between second and fourth place among the top 10 markets exporting tourists to Egypt during the period between 2010 to 2015.