Greece bans Brits when it reopens to tourists due to poor coronavirus record

Greece has banned Brits when it reopens to tourists due to our poor coronavirus record.

The government has said they will accept tourists from a list of 29 countries when international flights resume on June 15.

But the UK has not made the cut as expected after Greek tourism minister Haris Theoharis told ITV News that the UK's record on coronavirus is currently not good enough.

“I think that the UK has a big difference in terms of the current medical status of the country with Greece, so I don’t think it’s likely it will be there,” he said.

The countries lucky enough to be able to go on holiday in Greece are; Albania, Australia, Austria, North Macedonia, Bulgaria, Germany, Denmark, Switzerland, Estonia, Japan, Israel, China, Croatia, Cyprus, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Malta, Montenegro, New Zealand, Norway, South Korea, Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Czech Republic and Finland.

The list was compiled after a study of the epidemiological profile of the countries of origin of the tourists and after taking into account announcements from the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), as well as the relevant proposal of the Infectious Diseases Committee.

Tourists from the list of countries will be randomly tested at the airports.

Greece's government said that the list will be expanded on on July 1 and coronavirus data will continued to be monitored giving some hope to Brist that they may be able to holiday there laster this summer.

The news comes after Brits were also told that they would be blacklisted from Cyprus when it reopens to tourists next month.

Transport Minister Yiannis Karousos said the country will allow direct flights from 19 countries in two stages starting on June 9 with hotels opening from June 1.

All the countries on the list have been chosen because of their coronavirus data.

Mr Karousos said that Cyprus will allow flights from Greece, Malta, Bulgaria, Norway, Austria, Finland, Slovenia, Hungary, Israel, Denmark, Germany, Slovakia and Lithuania in the first stage.

Switzerland, Poland, Romania, Croatia, Estonia and the Czech Republic will all be allowed into Cyprus as part of the second stage from June 20.

Visitors will have to test negative for coronavirus within 72 hours of their flight if they want to be accepted during the first stage.

However, from June 20, those holidaymakers from the initial 13 countries won’t have to take the test.

From Monday compulsory quarantine for those entering the country will end with people being allowed to self-isolate at home.

Mr Karaousos gave a little hope to Brits hoping for a summer holiday by revealing that the list would be updated by the Health Ministry as time went on and new coronavirus data was received.