Poll: Would you travel outside your home country if it requires you to quarantine on return?

The UK experienced one of Europe’s worst cases of COVID-19 infections and deaths. As it slowly pulls out of the pandemic and loosens lockdown restrictions, concern about a second wave coming from outside is understandable. But if that is truly the government’s motivation, it hardly needs a quarantine rule. Most countries outside of the UK, including many European nations, have had far lower infection and death rates.

Maybe the UK government is focused not so much on dissuading foreigners—despite their potential to bring tourism and trade dollars to a financially wrecked country—but on keeping its own citizens at home? Why might that be? Potentially because many Brits like to spend their vacations in the warmer, sunnier climes of their European neighbors.

With summer arriving and Brits itching to get out, what better way to keep their vacation pounds and pennies inside the border than to threaten another 14-day lockdown on anyone who leaves?

Ultimately, some UK citizens may still believe it’s worth spending two weeks at home after a week’s vacation in Tenerife or Tuscany. But no foreigner will voluntarily enter another country’s quarantine, so they will take their vacation and trade dollars elsewhere. Vacation choices might revert to the UK in 2021; business deals, when done, tend to be permanent.

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