Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will publish the Government's criteria by which countries are placed on the red list for covid-19 travel restrictions.

The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) produces risk assessments in order to inform Ministerial decisions on border measures, including the addition of countries to the ‘red list’. These risk assessments review a range of factors for each country, including assessment of surveillance and sequencing capability, available surveillance and genome sequencing data, evidence of in-country community transmission of COVID-19 variants, evidence of exportation of new variants to the United Kingdom or other countries and travel connectivity with the UK.

Information on the UKHSA’s methodology is published alongside key summary data which is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-risk-assessment-methodology-to-inform-international-travel-traffic-light-system/risk-assessment-methodology-to-inform-international-travel-traffic-light-system