蜜芽传媒

On Thursday, Italy urged the rest of the EU to follow its lead and ensure Chinese arrivals were tested for Covid, and quarantined if necessary. The US, Japan, Taiwan and India also recently announced mandatory testing, as China deals with a Covid surge. However, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control said the surge was "not expected to impact" the EU.

So how should other nations react to try to restrict the spread of covid from Chinese international travellers? That's the question facing the decision-makers in the European Union.

Newsday heard from Dr Daniel Lopez-Acu帽a - a Spanish medical doctor specialising in public health and epidemiology and a consultant of the World Health Organization鈥檚 European Regional Office.

鈥淭he world is not ready for any new variant of the Covid. This is a very precarious equilibrium of control of the virus. If there is any new variant鈥� we will not have the population protected even if they have been vaccinated against previous variants.鈥�

(Pic: Passengers at the Malpensa Airport in Milan wait in a queue, after Italy ordered coronavirus disease testing for all travellers coming from China, where cases are surging; Credit: Reuters)

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