Will Mallorca get the green light for travel?
Sunday, April 25th, 2021
The UK is looking to re-start foreign travel on the 17th of May 2021 with the aid of a traffic light system. Once this arrangement is in place, the current ban on non-essential travel will be lifted. From then on, people wishing to travel abroad from the UK will no longer be required to fill in the “permission to travel” form and provide a valid reason for their journey, as is currently the case.
The traffic light system will set out which rules people returning to the UK from abroad will have to adhere to. Travellers returning from green-listed countries will no longer need to quarantine (although testing will still be required), while quarantine arrangements continue to apply for people returning from amber and red-listed countries.
The different colours will be assigned according to individual countries’ Covid-19 statistics, including infection and vaccination rates and the potential presence of any Covid variants. So far, no clear announcements have been made as to which countries or regions will be on the green list, and a decision on this is awaited eagerly by many who are hopeful for a summer holiday abroad.
While it is rumoured that Spain may find itself on the amber list, there is some hope that the Balearic Islands, including Mallorca, might make it onto the green list. Due to the fact that islands are expected to get a separate rating from the mainland, there is a good possibility of this happening.
Mallorca has been doing very well in terms of its infection rates over the last few months and the situation has presented as stable, despite a marked increase in tourism over the Easter period. The 7-day incidence for the Balearic Islands on Friday, 23rd April was reported to be 26 per 100,000 (in comparison to 112 per 100,000 for the whole of Spain).
Despite a few temporary setbacks with the vaccination programme, as of Saturday, 24th April, 289,791 vaccine doses had been administered across the Balearic Islands, with 71,502 people having received two doses. With a total population of 1,210,725, while only 6% of the population have been fully vaccinated so far, around 18% of residents in the Balearic Islands have by now received at least one dose of the vaccine. Health services in the islands are working hard to increase these numbers.
A decision on the traffic light status for different countries and regions is expected to be announced on the 10th of May. Fingers crossed that Mallorca will be given the green light!
For more information on this topic, please see the following articles:
“Mallorca is amber – for now“
“Mallorca remains on Britain’s amber list in June“
