Exit to the limit of London

The UK has experienced increasing isolation for fear of the new strain of the coronavirus, with numerous countries in Europe and around the world suspending their flights to London and closing their borders to the British.

The blockade is especially dramatic in the accesses to the Eurotunnel through the Dover pass, with thousands of trucks stopped, many of them Spanish, although, for the moment, none from Palencia, according to sources from Aempatra, the main transporters association in the province. And the same is true on the other side of the English Channel, at the entrance to Calais, in northern France. In fact, the Gallic country has been one of the first countries to close its connections with the United Kingdom, but shortly afterwards Germany, Italy, Belgium, Russia, Switzerland, Ireland, Poland and the Baltic States did, and by mid-afternoon Spain joined and Portugal.

For the rest, the British Government reported 33,364 new coronavirus infections on Monday in twenty-four hours. The new data indicated that infections had soared 54.8% in the past seven days, corroborating the widespread idea that the new variant is supposedly more easily transmitted.

And in all this mess, a woman from Palencia, María Arroyo, 22, a neighbor of the capital, has been one of the few people who was able to leave the United Kingdom on Monday in the last 102 flights scheduled that day to the national territory. “I learned about the decision of the European Union to suppress, in a general way, flights from Great Britain on the plane back home,” he acknowledged to Diario Palentino after spending his first night on the banks of the Carrión and with his family .

The links between London and María Arroyo, a journalism graduate, began to intertwine on September 5 when, after finishing her university degree, she decided to embark on an adventure in British lands as an au pair within a family on the island. Those were the times when the British Government had already requested that no one travel to Spain due to the high incidence of the coronavirus, which, incidentally, caused an entire economic earthquake due to the enormous dependence of Spain on tourism. However, over the weeks the citizens of this old empire have been accumulating cases and incidence of Covid-19 to the point that in recent days its Government has announced very restrictive measures to alleviate the situation. «In general, the English are very irresponsible because they do not generally use the mask. In fact, they seldom accept the recommendations made by the health and political authorities, unlike what happens in Spain ”, María Arroyo tells Diario Palentino.

“To break a spear in their favor, I have to say that the use of a mask is not mandatory there, except in public transport. Unlike Spain, in the United Kingdom only the BBC reports cases on a percentage basis and specifically underlines the percentage of Covid patients who are admitted to hospitals ”, underlines María Arroyo. “To give you an idea, after Johnson’s announcement on Saturday about a harsh lockdown in part of England due to the impact of the new mutated strain of coronavirus, people subsequently went out en masse to do their Christmas shopping,” adds this young woman Palencia.

María Arroyo details that if the Spanish Security Forces and Corps are in harmony to tackle any hint of breaking current regulations regarding Covid, “in England, the police are much more permissive. He advises you but it doesn’t happen from there. To make matters worse, young people do not contribute to the improvement of the situation.

But once the alarms were raised about the new strain of the SAR-Cov-2 virus, María had the expertise to take the necessary steps to be able to return home: «I found out all the steps to follow and, in this sense, I have I have to say that while in the United Kingdom no control was made, when I arrived in Spain it was the opposite. In any case, I did a PCR for the private. Then, on the plane, already in Madrid, a control was waiting for us; and then another in passports where travelers from England were required to have the corresponding certificate of having carried out the PCR test. But the thing was not here, after all these first controls a nursing service demanded the QR. It is a Health Control Form (FCS) associated with the trip to present it at the Health Control of the airport of arrival in Spain and, in addition, we verified that random rapid tests were carried out, which shocked me greatly. Come on, from what I see in Spain the controls are exhaustive, while there, until now, they have taken it more lightly ».

For now, María Arroyo will enjoy the Christmas holidays with her family and her intention is to return to the United Kingdom from January 1, 2021. “I don’t know what will happen. I intend to return but everything will depend on the evolution of events “, he points out, although he emphasizes that” I only ask the population to be responsible because you cannot play with Covid-19. Everyone, old and young, must be aware that we are in danger and we must take maximum care of ourselves and act responsibly.

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