Germany
has decided to reclassify Spain as a COVID-19 risk area from Sunday. The
decision was taken after the seven-day incidence per 100,000 people in Spain
rose to nearly 180, the Federal Foreign Office (AA) said.

The new travel
warning will not affect travel to Spain immediately, the Xinhua News Agency
quoted the AA as saying on Friday.

If Spain
were to exceed an incidence rate of 200 however, it would be classified as a ‘high-incidence’
area and will then require German travellers to Spain, who are not fully
vaccinated, to quarantine.

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The AA
has also designated Cyprus as a high-risk area after the country logged nearly
600 new infections per 100,000 population over the last seven days. Cyprus
currently has the highest incidence rate in Europe.

As of
now, Germany classifies Cyprus, Portugal, Russia and the UK as high-risk areas
in Europe, as per the nation’s official travel regulations.

Germany
itself has been seeing a recent rise in incidence rate, but remained relatively
low at 5.5 on Friday.

Germany
has officially reported 3,742,355 COVID-19 cases since the beginning of the
outbreak. The death toll stands at 91,190, according to Robert Koch Institute
(RKI), the federal agency for disease control and prevention.

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Germany’s
decision comes a day after UK decided to remove the mandatory quarantine
requirement for residents returning from amber list countries which includes
Spain.

Meanwhile,
Spain has had to reintroduce restrictions after the country recorded 40% of European mainland’s infections over the last few
weeks. The recent surge in cases is being attributed to the wide transmission
of the Delta variant.

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Spanish health minister Carolina Darias
recently said that most new cases are linked to end-of-term student parties. “One
in every 100 cases in 20 to 24-year-olds is admitted to hospital,” Darias had
said earlier this week at a news conference.