They're not paranoid.

Tom

Totally agree re skiing holiday. Those of us who have not seen family for many many months have sacrificed a lot- and it makes me mad (and I am a keen skier).

As for freight- I have no idea, can someone enlighten me. How much freight travelling by Tunnel or Ferries is 'un-accompanied'. Can you have fresh produce, including live shell fish, lobsters, etc, travelling 'un-acoompanied'?

Just received official message from Le Shuttle on FB, closing from 22.00 hrs.

''Following the announcement by the French Government that it will not accept persons arriving from the UK for at least 48 hours from midnight CET, access to the Eurotunnel Folkestone terminal will be suspended for passenger and Freight traffic from 22:00 GMT tonight, Sunday 20 December.
Customers with bookings after this time are advised NOT to travel to the terminal as they will not be able to cross to France.''

For us, those going home are less likely to come here.

"The new Corona variant has reached Italy. The Ministry of Health of the southern European country announced that the mutation had been detected in a patient. The patient and another person had returned from Great Britain in the past few days and landed in Rome by plane. The patient is now in quarantine."

https://www.20min.ch/story/neue-coro...n-321219397567

Denmark, Netherlands and Australia too according to the WHO. All those travel bans could already be too late.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-55382212

If this variant spreads as easy as it sounds, that won't matter much. Also, the reports here from Zermatt and Klosters sound like a lot of Brits are already enjoying Switzerland.

Still, if most of EU closes borders with UK, Switzerland might be well advised to follow. We get already a lot of bad press for the relaxed approach, and if Switzerland becomes the new Ischgl this will cost points in Brussels for when it gets to other things like Rahmenabkommen etc.

Great. So now all of those other passengers on that plane were potentially exposed to that same mutated virus.

I don't know why they didn't stop travel out of the UK as soon as they knew about -- or even suspected -- the outbreak there, with this mutation. They knew last Monday (six days ago) that the outbreak there was due to a mutation that causes the virus to spread more easily.

According to 20 minuten who quote Blick, Switzerland will not allow entries from UK & South Africa.

https://www.20min.ch/story/schweiz-v...a-391769196126


Update - The above had been confirmed
https://www.srf.ch/news/schweiz/das-...rossbritannien

Don't see how you can stop it... they have had a case in Australia, and their entry requirements are super strict.

I imagine there is a decent chance that's been caught in the immigration quarantine mind.

I agree it won't be stopped, but the longer it can be held back for, the more people the vaccination will save. Which is why it's so frustrating that no vaccination has taken place yet.

Yeah, I know they can't really stop it. But they can at least try to maintain some degree of control over the spread of this mutation, as much as is whatever possible -- particularly until the majority of people have been vaccinated. They shouldn't just let this thing go un-checked because "Well, some people have already spread it." I *really* don't think we want to just sit back and allow a mutated COVID virus that is 70% more contagious to spread throughout our our planet without trying to do something about it.

I wanted to go to the open-air ice rink with my kids and I was surprised when I saw on the website that it was closed today (because of a ban for opening on Sundays probably?). Isn't ice skating an outdoor winter sport? And I still cannot find information if it stays open after Tuesday, probably not.

Guess an ice rink might fall foul of the maximum 5 persons rule?

It seems to me it will still be open tomorrow. At least I didn't find any opposite information.

Funny that Park im Grüene in Rüschlikon is closed from today and the restaurant in it only from Tuesday. As if it's easier to get virus in the park than in the restaurant.

All this and the end of the Transition period on Brexit too !!
Makes me wonder if there is anything worth living for in the UK after the 31st December ?
Unless your a connoisseur of British traffic jams.

Canada too ... NOTAM is a Notice to airmen.

Crisis meeting and announcement today about the new mutation. https://www.20min.ch/story/bundesrat...n-870848946083

Quite a good article on the new variants from the UK and South Africa. So far many open question particularly for the UK variant (many names, but I call it the "London Virus").

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020...emains-unclear

I choose not to summarize the article, but both "fearmongers" and "deniers" will find food in there

NZZ reports that 10,000 passengers arrived in Geneva from the UK this last weekend before the ban...

However, the Bund is at least meeting about the problem. Perhaps ski piste closures will follow.