A COVID-19 Borderless Europe?

"Countries exporting tourists are particularly worried about returnees, and finding a collective approach is impossible. Primarily, the virus is driving the member states apart."                                                                                                               "[When it comes to keeping the virus at bay, despite a massive EU recovery package to aid Italy and Spain,countries are watching out for themselves]; they don't pay much attention to what [new restrictions] might mean for tourism in Greece or employment in Croatia."                                                                              Stefan Lehne, visiting scholar, Carnegie Europe 

"Mostly it is the considerate people who have behaved very cautiously on vacation anyway who take up the voluntary offers, while those who are more careless don't take a voluntary test."                                                                                  Chancellor Angela Merkel's chief of staff, Helge Braun

"At the moment, the freedom of people to get around Europe should be limited according to the number of cases."                                                                          Walter Ricciardi, Italian government adviser, World Health Organization

People enjoy the beach in Cadiz, south of Spain, on Friday, July 24, 2020. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

Optimism was high in the European Union that it was finally safe to reopen the borders that had been shuttered in the first wave of COVID-19 sweeping the continent. The tourism industry, like all others had been hit hard and governments were anxious to reopen borders to invite tourism to return to its former status, representing a significant proportion of many countries' GDP in a universal state of financial collapse in Europe, as elsewhere globally.

Europeans cheered, and prepared to resume business as usual as travellers and tourists, a huge relief from the enforced albeit necessary isolation in hopes of bringing the novel coronavirus pandemic under control. Restrictions lifted along with mandatory quarantines, people flocked to the French Riviera and the Greek islands for relief from boredom, seeking enjoyment during the feared-lost summer of 2020. This ebullience lasted all of several weeks.

That's all it took for coronavirus cases to rise, despite the ebb in cases earlier in the summer that gave such a lift to peoples' aspirations to rescue the summer-that-threatened-not-to-be. Governments across Europe haven once again now recognized a need to stem the rising tide of new coronavirus cases, giving second thought to the open Europe which has seen tourists bring the virus with them, and others taking the virus back home with them. Quarantines are being reinstated.

The effort aimed at rebooting the Mediterranean's tourist economy has served to slip the rug from under Europe's battle for virus control. Greece and Croatia, both popular tourism spots where the first wave of the coronavirus mostly bypassed, are experiencing a surge in cases within some of their most popular tourism regions, dealing with their largest outbreaks as a result, to date. 

Those countries experiencing their outbreaks early and succeeding in obtaining a level of control are now placing the blame on travel for an unexpected rise in cases. According to reports out of Italy, 30 percent of new cases there emanate from returnees who had been infected while abroad. New cases in Germany are estimated at an increase of 40 percent and Austrian chancellor Sebastian Kurz has stated "the virus is coming to Austria by car".

Newly imposed restrictions mostly apply to everyone travelling or returning from specific countries; occasionally they refer to "high risk" areas where, for example, people travelling from Barcelona to Belgium must now observe a mandatory 14-day quarantine, while travellers from Madrid rate a recommended quarantine. Britain has been steadily removing European countries from its safe travel list; Spain first, then Luxembuurg. Belgium, France, Malta and the Netherlands followed, then Croatia and Austria.

Northern Europe was sympathetic to the hardhit southern economies that led to a massive EU recovery package to primarily give aid to Italy and Spain. Now, however, in the interests of protecting themselves from further infection, travel to those troubled regions is once again off the books. Greece, now experiencing is highest daily cases, count 83 percent of positive cases as emanating from local transmission, and not incoming travellers.

Italy, early on the worst-hit country in Europe when the novel coronavirus raged through the country and devastated its hospitals, becoming the centre of the European pandemic, now has one of the lowest infection rates in Europe. Amidst fears that travellers just may be reimporting the virus. A list of 28 Italian hot spots across the country was published by the ANSA news agency, 11 of which were related to travel abroad to other countries in Europe.

 Tests for people coming from Malta, Greece, Croatia and Spain are now required in Italy; all countries where cases on a per-capita basis are several times higher than those in Italy. "We must continue the line of caution to defend the results achieved in recent months", stated Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza. 

Authorities ordered the closure of bars and nightclubs on the Spanish islands of Mallorca, Manorca, Ibiza and Formentera frequented by party crowds in an attempt to prevent a new wave of COVID-19. Joan Llado, AP