Torres hits back at the Canary Islands exclusion from UK green list

The president of the Canary Islands, Ángel Víctor Torres, has hit back at the decision of the UK Government for leaving the archipelago in the amber list for travel, and to continue demanding quarantines from all British citizens who return to their country, saying that “this does not conform to the epidemiological reality of the Canary Islands".

At a press conference this afternoon (Friday), Torres confirmed that his Government had trusted that the UK authorities would open up to analyze the situation of the pandemic in some Spanish regions separately from that of the country as a whole, in particular that of the Canary Islands and the Balearic Islands, two of the favourite destinations for British holidaymakers.

And he stressed that he believes that the Canary Islands fulfilled the conditions to enter the so-called "green list", that is, the list of destinations to which British tourists can travel without having to quarantine and have two PCR tests when returning home from their holidays.

As of today, the Canary Islands have a cumulative incidence rate of 68.84 cases per 100,000 inhabitants over 14 days, which is 50 points lower than the average for Spain (118.29), according to the latest data published by the Ministry of Health. The UK's 14-day rate is 63.5 cases per 100,000 population.

Until the emergence of Covid-19, the United Kingdom was the main source of tourists to the Canary Islands, with 37.5% of the total number of travellers from other countries (4.93 million out of a total of 13.14 tourists foreigners on the islands in 2019).

The holiday sector expected a different decision to gradually start to recover that market this summer, after having already entered the green lists of countries such as Germany (its second biggest market), the Netherlands, and Denmark.

Earlier today, the British Ambassador in Spain, Hugh Elliott, said that the islands were evaluated separately from Spain, but the epidemiological data led their decision to keep them as amber. He also said he believes it is possible that they could go green at the next review in three weeks time.