Covid-19 travel classification for Scotland (FOI)

Request

A

Can you advise how you came to the decision to place all of Scotland into the red zone of the traffic light system for travel from 15 June and placed all of England, Wales, NI and Eire in the green zone. The R rate varies throughout each of these countries and this actually appears discriminatory towards Scotland.

B

Can you also advise how you came to the decision that Children from a Red area have to isolate for 10 days even if they have a negative test result, whilst adults with a negative test result who have had vaccine do not need to isolate. The vaccine does not prevent someone contracting the illness but reduces the likelihood of severe reaction to it. (It should be noted at this time Children cannot be vaccinate, therefore this is rule discriminatory to children).

C

Can I also question the legality of your system as Jersey is part of the Common Travel Area, which allows passage throughout the area.

Response

A

The Government of Jersey classification system at that time was based on the key metric of number of confirmed COVID-19 cases per 100,000 population over a 14-day period. The threshold for regions / countries to be classified Red was 120 cases per 100k population. At the time of the classification update Scotland’s rate was above the 120 rate, England below.

B

The decision to reduce testing and isolation requirements for fully vaccinated passengers was made by Ministers informed by the Scientific and Technical Advisory Cell (STAC). The decision took account of the evidence of reduced infection rates and subsequent risk within cohorts of fully vaccinated passengers.

Subsequently, Ministers have reduced the testing and isolation requirements for children under the age of 18, again informed by STAC.

C

The Safer Travel Policy and testing and isolation requirements are legally underpinned by the COVID-19 Screening Assessment and Isolation Regulations 2020 by which all arrivals into Jersey are required to isolate for 14 days unless given permission not to do so.

As has been seen throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the nations of the Common Travel Area (CTA) have imposed a variety of public health border restrictions including for passengers within the CTA.