Airlines, passengers and businesses scrambled to respond to a deluge of travel restrictions announced over the weekend, intended to slow the spread of the omicron COVID-19 variant.
An initial spate of bans on flights from southern Africa, where omicron was first detected, gave way to more wide-ranging measures that will make travel more expensive and less convenient — if possible at all — recalling earlier days in the pandemic.
The U.K. reintroduced mandatory PCR tests for all arriving passengers and said they must self-isolate until they receive a negative result. Israel closed to all inbound foreign nationals for 14 days, the Philippines said travelers from European countries including Switzerland and the Netherlands won’t be welcome for several weeks and Singapore delayed the launch of travel lanes for vaccinated travelers from Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.