European Union leaders want to ban most travel to the continent for 30 days in an effort to counter the coronavirus pandemic that is rocking healthcare systems around the world.
“We think nonessential travel should be reduced right now,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told reporters Monday.
European nation leaders will discuss the proposal Tuesday, but von der Leyen found “strong support” for the idea over the weekend as she talked individually with governments in advance of the public proposal. She informed President Trump and other leaders of the G7 nations, which are the world’s largest industrialized democracies, earlier Monday during an emergency video conference to discuss the coronavirus outbreak.
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“There will be exemptions, for example, [for] EU citizens coming back home, for healthcare workers like doctors and nurses but also scientists working on the solution to this health crisis,” she said. “Also, for people commuting on borders, working on both sides of the borders for example, there will be exemptions.”
European officials were frustrated by Trump’s decision to restrict EU travel to the United States, which he unveiled last week as the number of confirmed cases rose dramatically in Italy and other European nations. “The European Union disapproves of the fact that the U.S. decision to impose a travel ban was taken unilaterally and without consultation,” von der Leyen said last week in a joint statement with European Council President Charles Michel.
Canada is also barring the entry of most foreign citizens, although U.S. citizens will be allowed to continue crossing the border. “I know that these measures are far-reaching,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who participated in the G7 video conference, said Monday. “They are exceptional circumstances calling for exceptional measures.”
The travel ban will help stop people from spreading “the virus further, be it within the European Union or by leaving the European Union,” which would also spare the health care system the burden of extra patients, von der Leyen said.
“This is important, that our healthcare system is able to deal with the amount of patients that are severely ill,” she said.
