At a press conference held just moments ago, led by Prime Minister Katrín Jakobsdóttir, Minister of Health Svandís Svavarsdóttir, Minister of Justice Áslaug Arna Sigurbjörnsdóttir, Minister of Finance Bjarni Benediktsson and Minister of Transport Sigurður Ingi Jóhannsson, a new pandemic response on border policy was announced.
Katrín went over the country’s vaccination policies, and their projections for who will be vaccinated and when.
Where the border is concerned, a bill will be submitted to Parliament this evening that will give the authority to the Minister of Health to oblige everyone who is coming from countries where there are more than 1,000 coronavirus infections per 100,000 to be sent to a quarantine centre, and no exemptions will be granted. An amendment will also be proposed that people who come from countries with an incidence of 750 per 100,000 inhabitants will have the general rule that they go to quarantine centres, but it is possible to apply for an exemption to stay at home.
The Minister of Justice will also be authorized to ban unnecessary travel to Iceland from countries where the coefficient of infection exceeds 1,000.
Those who can demonstrate that they have been vaccinated will still be able to enter the country without hindrance apart from a simple screening.
A bill on this will be submitted to Parliament this evening and if passed, these regulations will go into place immediately. The Prime Minister emphasised that how long these regulations are in place rests upon how well vaccinations within the country go.
The announcement comes in the wake of a new outbreak that has been traced back to two individuals who broke quarantine upon returning to Iceland, raising the possibility of re-instating the quarantine hotel, after the initial quarantine hotel was deemed unlawful.
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