Portugal has ‘reopened’ flights between UK and Brazil, but only for essential reasons.

Indeed, if one reads the government’s announcement today, the reality is that it is ‘prolonging restrictive measures on air traffic for the next two weeks’ – as well as controls of people arriving by road or boat.

“The suspension of flights with origin or destination in Brazil and the United Kingdom is lifted only for essential journeys, in the same way as has already happened with flights from third countries”, says the press statement from the ministry of interior administration, adding: “Essential journeys are those intended to allow the transit or entry into Portugal of citizens travelling for professional reasons, study, family reunions, health or humanitarian reasons”.

All passengers (except children under the age of 2) have to present a negative Covid test taken in the 72-hours preceding embarkation when they arrive in Portugal.

Passengers from countries which have an incidence level of Covid-19 above 500 cases per 100,000 inhabitants have not only to present a negative Covid PCR test on arrival, but they also must spend 14-days in quarantine “in their home or a place indicated by health authorities”.

The countries in this list include Brazil, South Africa, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Croatia, Slovenia, Estonia, France, Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden.

Reports add however that even travellers from countries with a virus incidence rating ‘equal or above 150 cases per 100,000 inhabitants’ are being advised that they can only come to Portugal for essential reasons. These countries have been cited as Germany, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Slovenia, Spain, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Norway, Romania and Switzerland.

Source: Portugal Resident