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COVID-19 & Travel

On 13 October, Member States adopted the EU Recommendation on a coordinated approach to travel restrictions in the context of COVID-19. This ‘traffic lights’ approach provides for regions across the European Union (EU) and European Economic Area (EEA) (+ UK) to be categorised as green, orange, red or grey, on the basis of the risk levels associated with COVID-19.

Passengers entering Ireland from red, orange and grey regions are requested to restrict their movements for 14 days. This request does not apply to certain categories of travellers:

.(A) International Transport Workers, including workers in aviation, maritime and road haulage sectors

(b) Travellers with an essential function or need as set out in paragraph 19 of the EU Council Recommendation, including:

  1. Passengers travelling for the purposes of an imperative business reason, only while carrying out that essential function
  2. Passengers arriving for imperative family reasons, only while pursuing that imperative reason

III. Returning passengers, who have carried out an essential function in another region, but who have otherwise restricted their movement while in that region

(c) Children aged 6 or under

(d) Passengers arriving from an “orange” region, who have received a negative/’not detected’ result from a COVID-19 Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test taken during the three days before departure to Ireland. Passengers are requested to have supporting evidence of the negative test in their possession

Until further notice, passengers arriving into Ireland from Denmark are requested to self-isolate for 14 days after their arrival, including those travelling for an essential purpose.

The map displaying how countries are categorised is available here – with the first map titled Combined indicator: 14 day notification rate, testing rate and positivity rate showing the colour categories. The classifications are broken down to regions within countries, and are updated on a weekly basis.

With effect from midnight 29 November 2020 passengers arriving from an “orange” or “red” or “grey” region are to restrict their movements for 14 days (other than the categories outlined above). This period of restricted movement can end if the passenger receives a negative/’not detected’ result of a PCR test that has been taken a minimum of five days after arrival in Ireland.

Further information is available from Gov.ie here and the Department of Foreign Affairs here.