CROATIA has been added to the UK’s quarantine list after a rise in coronavirus cases.
The Foreign Office is now warning holidaymakers to avoid “all but essential travel” to the holiday destination.
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Croatia joins the likes of Spain, France, Malta and the Netherlands, all of which are also on the ‘all but essential travel’ rule.
Most cases are reported near the Serbian border and in Zagreb.
Due to the risk this essentially means any holiday is cancelled.
However, the situation is constantly being monitored and the situation could be reversed once coronavirus cases start to decline.
British holidaymakers now returning from Croatia will have to quarantine for 14 days.
Croatia had been letting tourists from European countries in since mid-May and the tourism industry seemed to be doing well, with cafe’s and restaurants open for business.
Masks are now compulsory in public.
Grant Shapps said: “Data shows we need to remove Croatia, Austria and Trinidad & Tobago from our list of #coronavirus Travel Corridors to keep infection rates DOWN.
“If you arrive in the UK after 0400 Saturday from these destinations, you will need to self-isolate for 14 days.”
Croatia’s seven-day cumulative number of daily cases now stands at 30 per 100,000 people.
20 per 100k is one of the government’s main benchmarks for imposing quarantine restrictions on a country.
Croatia though was bumped from the list after the World Health Organisation said the Balkans region was considered a “hotspot” for coronavirus.
Croatia escaped the worst of the first wave of the pandemic owing to swift lockdowns and a lack of tourist arrivals at the tail-end of winter.
Dr Catherine Smallwood said: “The situation in the Balkans has been a concern of ours since early June when we started to see cases increase and it’s been very much a sub-regional hotspot over the summer period.
“We really need communities to take this on board, take the adequate steps both at a country level, in terms of the basic contact tracing, case identification and isolation and testing the systems that need to be in place.
“And then where there are hotspots and increased transmission, additional targeted measures need to be brought in place very quickly to nip transmission in the bud, stop it from spreading and keep the level of transmission at controllable levels.”
Darija Reic, the director of the Croatian national tourist office in London insisted the region was safe and said: “We are confident that Croatia is still a safe place for tourists, with the majority of the coast having low numbers of infections.
“Croatian authorities are continuously monitoring and adjusting Covid-related safety measures to ensure we are controlling the virus at all times.”
Tour operators and airlines are likely to stop flights and holidays now.
This will mean they will offer a refund or credit note, while some airlines are allowing passengers to move their flights free of charge.
