Washington – President Joe Biden will sign executive action to reinstate COVID-19 travel restrictions on non-US travelers from Brazil, Ireland, the UK and 26 other European countries that allow travel across open borders, he announced Monday the White House.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki also confirmed that South Africa would be added to the shortlist due to concerns about a variant of the virus that has spread beyond that nation.
“This is not the time to remove restrictions on international travel,” Psaki said at a news conference.
The top American expert on infectious diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci, on Monday described Biden’s decision as “prudent” in a round of television interviews.
“We are concerned about the mutation in South Africa,” Fauci told CBS This Morning. “We are looking at it very actively. It is clearly different and more disastrous than that in the UK, and I think it is very prudent to restrict the travel of non-citizens.”
Biden is reversing an order from President Donald Trump in his last days in office calling for the relaxation of travel restrictions starting Tuesday. The Trump move was made in conjunction with a new requirement from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that all international travelers to the U.S. obtain a negative COVID-19 test within three days of embarking on the flight.
Biden’s team had announced it would re-impose travel restrictions, but the addition of South Africa to the restricted travel list highlights the new administration’s concern about the virus mutations.
The South African variant has not been discovered in the United States, however another variant – originally from the United Kingdom – has been detected in several states.
Fauci said there is “a slight and modest decrease” in the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines against these variants, but “there is enough cushion with the vaccines we have that we still consider effective against both the UK strain as against the South African Strains “.
But he warned that more mutations are possible and said scientists are preparing to adapt vaccines if necessary.
“We really need to make sure we start, and we already have, to prepare if vaccines need to be updated,” Fauci said. “We are already taking steps in that direction even though the vaccines we have now work.”