Visiting Britons are no longer required to present negative PCR tests for Covid-19 when they enter Portugal – though Britain’s effective ‘safe travel’ ban remains in place.
The news, published by media in the UK, has been confirmed by the British foreign office (click here).
It doesn’t mean PCR tests are no longer acceptable. It simply means they can be substituted by either antigen tests (taken within 24-hours of travel) which meet “performance standards set out in the EU common list of Rapid Antigen Tests”, or any form of Nucleic Acid Amplification Tests (NAAT click here).
Indication that foreign travel is becoming exceptionally lucrative for testing laboratories, the news doesn’t really change anything in that Portugal remains on the UK’s amber list – and no matter what tests even fully-vaccinated Brits have to present to get here, every British citizen will be faced with 10-days quarantine in their own homes when they return from to UK.
The Daily Mirror adds that “making things even more confusing” is the fact that the British Foreign Office “still doesn’t advise against non-essential travel to Portugal which means that anyone who has a holiday booked isn’t automatically entitled to get their money back”.
