Coronavirus: Negative COVID-19 test needed to board flights to UK

Airlines flying into the United Kingdom will be required to bar passengers from boarding if they do not have a negative COVID-19 test within 72 hours of departure, transport minister Grant Shapps confirmed on Friday.

Every traveller coming into any U.K. port or airport will now be expected to have a negative test to enter as part of a significant toughening of border controls.

Shapps told BBC TV that a variety of tests "to a certain specification" would be accepted by authorities, and that the move was also an attempt to prevent a new variant of the virus from being brought into the U.K.

Despite the new variants, Heathrow Airport's Chief Executive John Holland-Kaye said the new rules must only be temporary and the government must plan for how to end it. He added that vaccination programs in Britain and other countries gave him hope for a travel recovery later this year.

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