President Donald Trump announced on Monday the upcoming reopening of American borders to European nationals in the Schengen area, to the British, Irish and Brazilians as of January 26, before being immediately contradicted by the spokesperson for the future president Joe Biden.
“Now is not the time to lift restrictions on international travel,” said Jen Psaki, on his Twitter account, who is officially due to take up his duties as spokesperson for new President Joe Biden on Wednesday.
With the pandemic worsening, and more contagious variants emerging around the world, this is not the time to be lifting restrictions on international travel.
– Jen Psaki (@jrpsaki) January 19, 2021
The tweets fell just minutes after the announcement of Donald Trump’s decision, justified by the introduction, on the same date, of an obligation to present a negative test for the coronavirus when entering the United States. .
To slow the progression of the pandemic, Donald Trump closed the United States’ borders to the 26 countries of the Schengen area on March 11, 2020, then to the United Kingdom and Ireland on the 14th, before doing the same for Brazil on May 24.
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“On the advice of our medical team, the (future) government does not intend to lift these restrictions on January 26,” Jen Psaki wrote on Twitter. “Moreover,” she added, “we plan to strengthen public health measures applied to international travel to further combat the spread of Covid-19.”
On the advice of our medical team, the Administration does not intend to lift these restrictions on 1/26. In fact, we plan to strengthen public health measures around international travel in order to further mitigate the spread of COVID-19.
– Jen Psaki (@jrpsaki) January 19, 2021
The threat of variants
The future White House spokeswoman also recalled that variants of the much more contagious virus had recently been identified for the first time in the United Kingdom and South Africa.
The British variant has already made its way to the United States, where it has been found in patients in several regions.
Some 10.5 million people have already been vaccinated against the coronavirus in the United States, but the campaign has suffered many hiccups. Less than 40% of the doses distributed have been administered to date, but several regions threaten to run out of vaccines this week, especially in New York State.
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