South Africa complains flight bans are ‘punishment’ for it detecting Omicron, new Covid-19 variant
- Many nations have banned flights from countries in southern Africa; South Africa government says ‘science should be applauded, not punished’
- ‘Variant of concern’ was found first in South Africa but has already been detected elsewhere, including Belgium, Hong Kong, Botswana, Israel
The decision by a host of countries to ban flights from southern Africa following the discovery of the Omicron variant “is akin to punishing South Africa for its advanced genomic sequencing and the ability to detect new variants quicker,” the foreign affairs ministry said in a statement.
“Excellent science should be applauded and not punished,” it said, adding that new variants had been discovered in other parts of the world.
“Each of those cases have had no recent links with Southern Africa, but the reaction to those countries is starkly different to cases in Southern Africa,” it said.
The variant was first discovered in South Africa and has since been detected in Belgium, Botswana, Israel and Hong Kong.
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UK bans travel from South Africa after emergence of new heavily-mutated Covid-19 variant
A minister in the German state of Hesse said on Saturday that the variant had very probably arrived in Germany, in a traveller returning from South Africa. Czech health authorities said they were examining a suspected case of the variant in a person who spent time in Namibia.