Germany to make coronavirus tests mandatory for all travellers

Germany has decided to ask all travellers to go through compulsory coronavirus testing before entering the country.

“We are checking whether it is legally possible to make someone do a test, because it would be an encroachment on freedom,” Health Minister Jens Spahn told a local radio channel.

Compared to the rest of the European countries, Germany has been successful in containing the  coronavirus pandemic. Germany had observed a strict lockdown for almost two months, before reopening its economy.

Spahn and his counterparts from the 16 federal states of Germany have also announced that these compulsory coronavirus tests will be free of cost. If tested negative, the travellers will not be asked to quarantine themselves for 14 days. However, the people who test positive will have to be quarantined for at least two weeks.

The local government claimed that they want to protect their citizens and the travellers, while making sure that their basic human rights are not violated.

The number of new confirmed cases increased sharply on Friday to 815, data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases showed, the biggest tally since mid-May. It remained high on Saturday with 781 new cases.