NEW DELHI:  Travellers coming from the UK to the national capital will not have to undergo a seven-day institutional and seven-day home quarantine.

An official order on January 29 released by Delhi Chief Secretary Vijay Dev said,”The situation has now been reviewed and considering low positivity rate of UK returnees, it has been decided that the additional measure of compulsory institutional quarantine of travellers testing negative may not be furthermore and the Delhi government may align with Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) issued by the Government of India from time-to-time in this regard.”

The Chief Secretary has directed the authorities to ensure strict compliance of the SOP issued by the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

On January 8, the Delhi government had ordered mandatory institutional quarantine for United Kingdom travellers for a period of seven days in view of the new variant of Covid-19 detected in the UK.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had said on January 8, “To protect Delhiites from exposure to the virus from the UK, the Delhi government has taken important decisions. Travellers coming from UK will have to mandatorily undergo a self-paid Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test on arrival at the airport. All those arriving from UK who test positive will be isolated at an isolation facility. Negative ones will be taken to a quarantine facility for seven days, followed by seven days of home quarantine.”

On December 23, the Central government suspended flights from the UK with all passengers coming from there having to be tested on arrival at airports.

IANS