The new delta variant of the coronavirus has been detected in Ukraine, pushing them to increase border restrictions.
Citizens coming from Britain, India, Russia and Portugal will have to get tested at the border checkpoints starting from Friday, Ukraine Business News writes. The tests are provided in the airports for around 25 USD and will be ready with an answer within 30 minutes. However, should affected people get a positive test, they will be denied entry to the country,
So far there are no rules for passengers accompanying Brits, Indians, Russians or the Portuguese travellers. Meaning, that you will not be subject to extra testing or harsher quarantine rules, if you are flying to Ukraine on the same plane as people from these countries who tests positive.
As mentioned, Ukraine detected the first case of the delta variant last week, according to Reuters. This strain of the virus is believed to be more contagious than many other variants of the virus, but even though the first case has been registered in Ukraine, they still do not have the capability to test for it on a wider scale.
Speaking of testing…
According to Kyiv Post, only 285 new cases of COVID19 was registered as of 9 AM this morning while 723 patients recovered and 9 died. While of course these are good news compared to the numbers we saw in the spring, but that does not mean that they are entirely solid numbers.
In the past 24 hours, 12,098 PCR tests and 2,442 antibody tests were performed and analyzed in Ukraine. With a population around 40 million people, naturally that is not giving the full picture. On average, 14,000 tests spread out over 24 oblasts gives less than 500 tests per region.
With false negatives taken into account, this means that a lot of people can be carrying the disease around without symptoms. So far, 2.2 million cases and 52,295 deaths have been registered in Ukraine making it one of the hardest hit countries in Europe.
Vaccination
The vaccination progress in Ukraine is still somewhat negligible. 550,966 people have been fully vaccinated so far. 97,130 got a vaccination on Friday which was record breaking for the Ukrainian health authorities that have struggled to procure vaccines and convince the population to get the jab.
Now, it seems, procurement of vaccines might prove even more difficult. According to UBN, China is threatening to withhold delivery of Chinese vaccines to Ukraine, because the Zelensky government is supporting an investigation into the human rights situation in Xinjiang.
China is a major supplier of vaccines to Ukraine. In July alone, Ukraine is expecting a delivery of 7.7 million vaccine doses largely from Chinese CoronaVac. China is also Ukraine’s largest trade partner. The relationship between the two countries is rather delicate after the Motor Sich situation.
