Pre-departure Covid tests would be valuable, say Sage scientists

Pre-departure Covid testing for travellers returning to the UK would be "valuable", the government's Sage advisory committee have said.

It also says the government's policy of asking travellers to take a test two days after they arrive would "identify significantly fewer cases" than extra tests on days five or eight.

The advice is in the minutes of a meeting held on Monday seen by the BBC.

Earlier this week Labour called for the reintroduction of pre-departure tests.

And the Scottish and Welsh governments have argued that travellers should be required to take additional coronavirus tests, eight days after their arrival.

The document, which has not yet been published, also says that the government should be preparing for "a potentially very significant wave with associated hospitalisations" now, even before scientists have established how dangerous the Omicron variant might be.

But the advisors stress how much uncertainty there is around the variant's transmissibility and the effectiveness of the vaccine and some of their warnings are based on a theoretical worst case.

The emergence of the new coronavirus variant prompted the government to introduce new travel restrictions, which came into force on Tuesday.

It means that everyone entering the UK (other than those coming from the Common Travel Area that covers the Channel Islands and Ireland) must take a PCR test by the end of the second day after their arrival and self-isolate until they receive a negative result.

On Tuesday, Labour called on the government to go further and reintroduce pre-departure Covid tests for anyone travelling to the UK.

In a letter to the home secretary and health secretary, Labour's shadow home office and health ministers Yvette Cooper and Wes Streeting wrote: "Currently it is possible for people to travel to the UK on crowded planes, stand in crowded departure halls, get on crowded tubes, buses and trains home to rejoin family or housemates without taking a test at any point along the way - not even a lateral flow test at the airport before they get on a plane.

"Given that Omicron has now been identified in 19 different countries, this basic testing is an urgent requirement."