Covid 4th wave scare: Random testing for international passengers to start from December 24

The increase in Covid-19 cases around the world has prompted countries to take the necessary action to control the situation. The government announced on Thursday that starting on December 24, a specific percentage of travellers on international flights will be liable to a random coronavirus test.

Due to an increase in coronavirus cases in many nations, the Union health ministry wrote to the civil aviation ministry regarding this issue. An official communication stated that, "a sub-section of 2 per cent of the total passengers in the flight shall undergo random post-arrival testing at the airport on arrival".

In response to a spike in Covid cases in many nations, including China, India will continue random checks of 2% of all international arrivals on Saturday, December 24 at 10 AM. Airlines will choose randomly, and after collecting the samples, passengers will be free to depart.

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"Globally the number of new cases of Covid-19 continues to remain alarmingly high, with approximately 5.9 lakh daily new cases reported on average during the week ending on December 19," Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan stated in written letter to Aviation Secretary Rajiv Bansal on Thursday.

This decision was made in response to the sudden increase in Covid-19 cases in China, South Korea, Brazil, France, Japan, and the United States of America. It has been decided that the ministry of civil aviation, in collaboration with airport operators and AirPort Health Offices to help in reducing the risk of entrance of new variant of SARS-CoV-2 virus (preferably from different countries). Following are the steps that will be taken:

1. A subset of 2% of the total passengers in the flight shall undergo random post-arrival testing at the airport on arrival

2. Those passengers in each flight shall be identified by the concerned airlines.

3. Passengers will provide the samples and will be permitted to leave the airport.

(With inputs from agencies)