US lifts travel restrictions to Africa via Omicron

A White House spokesman, Kevin Muñoz, said on Twitter that US President Joe Biden made this decision following the recommendations of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), one of the highest authorities in US public health.

“The limitations have given us time to understand omicron and we know that our vaccines work against omicron, especially booster doses,” Muñoz added.

These restrictions have affected travelers who have been in those countries in the past 14 days. However, they did not affect US citizens or lawful permanent residents of the US who were in those countries, even though the government required them to test negative for COVID-19 before traveling to US soil.

Infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci said on Monday that the lifting of restrictions was because “there are enough infections in our country…we are letting in people from other countries who are infected with as much or more of South African countries”.

US President Joe Biden’s government has received a barrage of criticism for imposing and maintaining these travel restrictions that only affect South Africa despite the fact that the new type of coronavirus has been spreading at a high speed around the world.

With information from AFP, EFE and Reuters