SIR – January 24 Matt Hancock announces 77 cases of the South African variant had been detected in the UK.  No change to border policy.

 February 5 councils in Worcestershire say the South African variant is present in Fernhill Heath. Community transmission is here, in our local area. 

February 15 limited hotel quarantine comes in to force, for “travellers”, arriving from “red list’ countries in England.

In Wales and Northern Ireland, where there are no direct international flights, travellers destined for those areas, will book and pay for quarantine in England.  In Scotland, all travellers arriving from by air from abroad will have to go into quarantine hotels.

Contrast this with Australia, which has reported 909 deaths and New Zealand, which has reported 25 deaths.

Yes those figures are correct and both countries have been praised, for their handling of the pandemic.

In Australia, people staying in quarantine hotels, are not allowed to leave their rooms. This follows incidents in the early months of the pandemic, when security guards and hotel guests were seen to mingle and one of the outbreaks led to a surge in cases, which forced Melbourne into a five-month lockdown.

In Zealand, on February 14, Prime Minister Jacinda Arden ordered Auckland to go into lockdown after the discovery of three new local cases of Covid-19, to allow the government to get more information and testing to determine any community transmission.

In February of last year, New Zealand banned entry to any foreigner coming from or via China. 

The ban was quickly extended to Iran, South Korea and northern Italy.  By March 16 2020, everyone including New Zealanders, had to go into self-isolation on arrival. 

At that point New Zealand had recorded only 102 cases and no deaths. When the UK locked down at around the same time, it had more than 6,500 cases and more than 330 deaths.

The UK has never closed its borders. Mandatory self-isolation for all arrivals was brought in very late, June of last year. Also lifted for some countries, by early July. 

It does not take an expert to work out how this latest flawed hotel quarantine policy will play out.

Cllr Mel Allcott

Claines ward, Worcester