Germany’s New Lockdown Rules Require Travelers to Present 2 Negative COVID-19 Tests
Travel to Germany just got more difficult as the country recently implemented stricter lockdown rules against a second wave of COVID-19.
On Monday, all of Germany's 16 federal states enacted tougher lockdown measures, including new travel and gathering restrictions. Now, anyone traveling to Germany from a "high-risk area" (which includes the U.S.) will be required to provide two negative COVID-19 tests before being allowed to move about the country, DW reported. A quarantine period of five days is required between the two tests, even if the first test is negative.
Travelers are also required to complete an online registration form before entering.
Germany's prior restrictions — which included closing nonessential shops, encouraging employees to work from home, closing schools, and banning alcohol consumption in public — were set to remain in place until Jan. 10. However, since the measures have had little impact on the spread of the virus, they have been extended.
The country is on alert against the new, seemingly more contagious strain of COVID-19 that emerged in the UK. Despite many countries shutting down travel from the UK, the coronavirus strain was found to have already spread to more than 40 countries around the world, including Germany and the U.S.
Like the UK, Germany has also rolled out a COVID-19 vaccine however they've been criticized for its slow wide release. Despite having the infrastructure to vaccinate more than 300,000 people each day, Germany only gave 533,000 shots in the first two weeks of its vaccination drives, according to Reuters. That number far less than half of the 1.3 million doses Germany has received. In the same amount of time, Britain has vaccinated more than 2 million people.
Germany has reported more than 1.9 million cases of COVID-19 over the past year and more than 40,900 deaths.
Cailey Rizzo is a contributing writer for Travel + Leisure, currently based in Brooklyn. You can find her on Twitter, Instagram, or at caileyrizzo.com.
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