Britain’s Heathrow airport has refused to allow extra flights from India before the country was added on Friday to Britain’s “red list” of areas where most of the checkpoints have been banned due to multiple Covid-19 cases, the airport said on Wednesday, 21st April 2021.
The move comes after Britain found more than 100 cases of coronavirus variant for the first time in India, Health Minister Matt Hancock said on Monday. “We have made a difficult but important decision to include India on the Red List. This means that anyone who is not a UK or Irish citizen, or a British citizen cannot enter the UK if he or she has been in India for the past 10 days,” Hancock had told the parliament.
Heathrow Airport’s refusal to allow other flights from India was previously reported by the BBC, with the airport adding that it was rejecting flight applications due to concerns over the status of the passport control queues. The airport also told Reuters it did not want to increase the existing pressure on the border by allowing more passengers to fly in.
India is now facing a “storm” of coronavirus that is disrupting the health system, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a national address on Tuesday, when the second most populous country reported 295,041 new coronavirus infections on Wednesday – the largest daily increase reported in any country – stretching its hospitals to breaking point. The death toll of 2,023 in India in one day were also its highest in the pandemic.
At least 24 Covid-19 patients in western India died on Wednesday when oxygen in their ventilators ran out, amid national gas shortages and an increase in infections. The health experts say that India had let its guard down when the virus seemed to be under control during the winter, allowing for large gatherings such as weddings, celebrations, and festivals. Modi is himself facing criticism for addressing packed political rallies in the run-up to local elections and allowing religious ceremonies to continue where millions of people gathered.
