61 South Africans test positive for Covid in Netherlands
More than 60 South Africans are believed to have tested positive for Covid-19 in the Netherlands, hours after they arrived on two different flights.
Around 600 passengers arrived at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport on the two KLM flights from Johannesburg and Cape Town on Friday and faced hours of delays amid heightened fears of a fourth wave of infections.
They were in the air en route to the Netherlands when the European Union (EU) announced a travel ban from South Africa and other southern African countries, where the new Covid-19 variant Omicron, have been identified.
The group is expected to quarantine at the hotel for seven days if they show symptoms and for five days if they do not
“"We now know that 61 of the results were positive and 531 negative," says the Dutch Health Authority in a statement.
"The positive test results will be examined as soon as possible to determine whether this concerns the new worrisome variant, which has since been given the name Omicron variant."
The latest developments come amid fears that the new variant could be spreading in southern Africa.
“Instead just after landing, they are confronted with a situation we have never before experienced in the Netherlands, namely that people have to be tested at Schiphol and are forced to wait until they get a result."
The United States, Brazil, Canada, and Saudi Arabia became the latest countries to restrict travel from the continent where Omiron strain has been labelled a "variant of concern”.
Scientists are now racing to determine the threat posed by the heavily mutated strain, and whether the current coronavirus vaccines should be adjusted.
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