During the day there will be more clarity regarding the entry ban from the UK. This is what Home Secretary Annelies Verlinden has promised (CD&V) the morning On Radio 1. Verlinden’s two-week entry ban appears to be realistic.
Interior
“We pulled the emergency brakes yesterday to make sure we don’t bring much of this bad kind of virus to Belgium in the short term,” explains Verlinden. The measure applies for a period of 24 hours, but we will monitor it on the Belgian and European levels, because our country is at an intersection and it makes no sense for us to close our borders on one side and enter from the other side. “
The minister confirmed that Belgians who were still in the UK could contact the Foreign Ministry.
Verlinden says that during the day there will be more news about more actions in the short and medium term. This concerns the organization of (economic) activities but also the planned trips or return to Belgium.
South Africa
An entry ban until 6 January seems realistic. If you want to shut down the air traffic, you can do that for a week or two. But we must first investigate the impact of this mutating virus and how far it actually exists in Belgium. I also hear that certain strains of this species are already in South Africa, so a global approach is needed. I expect we’ll get more clarity on this from virologists this morning.
“There is no reason to panic,” the minister concludes. But if we don’t, there could be sounds in which we were not careful enough. We tried to find a balance between these two things using this short duration scale. We will definitely continue to decide and communicate about this today.
The British themselves are also leaving the capital en masse after announcing a tighter lockdown:
