ISLAMABAD: The United Kingdom has decided to retain Pakistan on its “red list” of countries with a travel ban as the "actual number" of COVID-19 cases in the South Asian nation are likely to be much higher than those reported, local Pakistani media said.
Several quoted a leaked communication between Britain’s Health Minister Lord James Nicholas Bethell and Pakistani MP Yasmin Qureshi.
Britain's three-tier travel curbs separate countries into a green, amber and red list of destinations, each carrying different restrictions for arrivals into the UK.
The UK added Pakistan and India to its "red list" of countries in April, following a surge in cases of the highly virulent Delta variant of the coronavirus.
India was later upgraded to the “amber list”, where its nationals must provide proof of vaccination and negative COVID-19 test results on arrival in the UK.
Pakistan, however, was retained on the “red list” with all Pakistanis required to undergo a costly 10-day hotel quarantine, prompting outrage from several officials and lawmakers across the country.
Lord Bethell said the decision was taken because Pakistan's "national testing rate varies considerably across regions."
"For example, in Punjab, Pakistan’s most densely populated region, with the highest number of active cases, testing is below Pakistan’s average rate and is the second-lowest in the country,” Lord Bethell told Qureshi, Chair of All Parties Parliamentary Group on Pakistan.
Expressing disappointment over the UK’s move, Pakistan’s High Commission in London said it would entail "continuing hardship for thousands of Pakistanis and British Pakistanis."
Disappointed with decision to retain on Red List. Entails continuing hardship for thousands of Pakistanis and British Pakistanis. Had shared all relevant data. Question mark over equity & consistency of criteria being employed!@grantshapps @sajidjavid @JimBethel @tariqahmadbt
— Pakistan High Commission London (@PakistaninUK) August 26, 2021
Earlier this month, Health Chief Dr. Faisal Sultan, in a letter to UK officials, cited official data to show that Pakistan had the lowest daily cases, death toll, positivity rate and total mortality rate in the entire region.
At least 69 new deaths and 3,909 cases were reported in the past 24 hours on Sunday, taking the total number of instances to 1,152,481 and the fatality count to 25,604 since the start of the pandemic last year, official data showed.
Statistics 29 Aug 21:
Total Tests in Last 24 Hours: 62,918
Positive Cases: 3909
Positivity % : 6.21%
Deaths : 69— NCOC (@OfficialNcoc) August 29, 2021
Pakistan has administered over 50 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine to its population of over 220 million people since launching its national drive in February.
