FROM TODAY, PASSENGERS arriving into this country from anywhere will be asked to restrict their movements for 14 days.
This is because the Department of Foreign Affairs’ updated Green List has kicked in, and it has no countries on it.
Until midnight this morning Cyprus, Finland, Latvia and Liechtenstein were on the Green List but, based on the latest epidemiological data from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), these countries have now been removed.
When the Green List was instituted, the DFA outlined that countries would make the list only if they had Covid-19 incidence rates of less than 25 per 100,000 over the past 14 days.
As a second wave of the coronavirus began to sweep across Europe, fewer and fewer counties had a low enough rate to qualify to be on the Green List.
Speaking this week, Transport Minister Éamon Ryan said that the Green List is no longer working because no countries with direct flights to Ireland qualify.
As an effective replacement for the Green List, the government has signalled its intention to join the EU-wide traffic light system for travel. The system may be agreed at EU level tomorrow but the government has said that it may take some time for Ireland to align with it completely.
As well as being asked to restrict their movements, people arriving into Ireland are legally required to complete a Covid-19 Passenger Locator Form.
It was revealed last week that five people were referred to Garda immigration officials for refusing to fill out the forms
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