The federal government has relaxed the entry restrictions for Great Britain, South Africa, Namibia and six other African countries, which were imposed due to the widespread use of the Omikron variant. The nine countries, which also include Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, will be downgraded from virus variant areas to high-risk areas from Tuesday, as the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) announced on Monday evening.
Most recently, airlines were essentially only allowed to carry German citizens or people living in Germany to Germany. The rule also applied to rail and ship traffic. There is also a two-week quarantine obligation for those arriving from virus variant areas – including those who have been vaccinated and those who have recovered.
Anyone who enters from a high-risk area and is not fully vaccinated or recovered has to be in quarantine for ten days and can only get rid of it with a negative test five days after arrival at the earliest. Countries and regions with a particularly high risk of infection are classified as high-risk areas. But not only the infection numbers are decisive for this. Other criteria are the speed at which the virus is spreading, the burden on the health system or a lack of data on the corona situation.