Race to get out of UK for Christmas: Huge queues at British airports with 200 flights cancelled as Spain, Russia and India join list of FORTY nations to slam door on UK - while Ireland lays on planes to get citizens home

Which countries have banned flights from the UK?

France imposed an inbound travel ban from 11pm last night

Spain will ban all entries from the UK except for Spanish nationals and residents from tomorrow

Germany, Poland, Sweden, Finland, Austria, Romania, Malta, Croatia, all suspended flights from the UK

Italy blocked all flights from the UK until 6 January

Bulgaria suspending flights from the UK until 31 January

Netherlands banned all passenger flights from the UK until 1 January

Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia banned flights from the UK until 31 January

Denmark suspended all flights from Britain for 48 hours as of this morning

Norway stopped planes from the UK for two days

Belgium halted flights and trains from the UK from midnight for at least 24 hours

Greece extended its quarantine period for travellers from the UK from three days to seven

Portugal says only Portuguese people and residents can arrive from the UK

In the Republic of Ireland, flights arriving from Britain are banned for 48 hours at least from midnight on Sunday and people have been asked not to 'travel to Ireland, by air or sea'.

Turkey has temporarily banned all flights from the UK

Canada suspended entry of all flights from the UK for 72 hours

Russia is suspending flights from the UK for one week

India is suspending flights from the UK from midnight on Tuesday until 31 December

Hong Kong, Israel, Iran, Croatia, Morocco and Kuwait brought in restrictions on UK travel

In Latin America, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador and Peru all banned flights from the UK

Saudi Arabia has suspended all international flights for one week while Jordan suspended flights from the UK for two weeks

Czech Republic says arrivals who have spent at least 24 hours in UK territory will need to isolate

There was chaos at airports across Britain today with more than 30,000 travellers stranded and hundreds of flights cancelled as more than 40 countries move to isolate the UK in a bid to contain a mutant strain of coronavirus.

A growing number of countries are banning flights from the UK in a bid to stop the new Covid variant crossing their borders, sparking panic at terminals across the continent.

The move has led to queues of people anxiously waiting for Covid tests at Heathrow Airport in west London where more than 80 departures have been grounded so far today - more than half of which are on British Airways - with that number continually rising as more countries ban incoming flights.

Under pressure from New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, BA announced it will require passengers traveling from the UK to New York City to test negative for COVID-19 before boarding their flight.

Virgin Atlantic has not yet said whether it will enforce testing, nor have US-owned Delta, American Airlines or United Airlines.

America was yet to make an announcement on a travel ban, though last night US Assistant Secretary for Health, Brett Giroir, warned ‘everything is on the table’.

At least 200 flights to Europe have been cancelled, with the routes affected including Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Frankfurt, Geneva and Paris and long-haul flights to Russia and India.

A spokesman for Heathrow told Mailonline that only passengers with a ticket to a destination that has not yet banned UK arrivals will be allowed in the airport.

The spokesman added: 'If you don't have a ticket, or are travelling to a country with an active ban in place, do not come to the airport. We do not want the airport flooded or similar scenes that were seen at St Pancras on Saturday night.'

Heathrow is not testing people arriving in the UK from other countries - because the government has not yet made it a policy.

The spokesman added: 'We've been pushing for testing since April but still don't have the go-ahead from the government. As soon as they're ready to catch up, we are ready to go.'

But Ireland's Foreign Affairs Minister confirmed the Department of Transport is looking at organising a limited number of flights today and tomorrow to accommodate those who need to return to Ireland for Christmas.

The news will come as a shot in the arm to Irish residents left stranded in the UK, after the Irish Government issued a 48 hour travel ban on anyone entering the country from the UK.

British passengers were left stranded in German airports last night and confined in a terminal until they could test negative for Covid-19 after Europe moved to seal off the UK because of its alarming new strain of the disease.

Nurses in hazmat suits were screening the last arrivals from Britain on Sunday night as furious passengers were told they would have to sleep in the same room and wait until morning to leave the airport.

The PM will chair a meeting of Cobra this morning after the travel bans spread beyond Europe with Canada, Chile and Argentina also cutting off the UK, although the United States has yet to do so.

Germany is one of more than a dozen European countries to have closed down flights from the UK, while France has also closed the border to lorries, sparking fears for cross-Channel food supplies - although France said today that it would establish a protocol 'in the next few hours' for traffic to resume.

In Hanover, airport officials set up campbeds for 63 people who arrived from Britain, with one passenger, Manuela Thomys, saying that 'we are being held against our will' and another deciding to turn back to the UK.

'Please help us leave!' Thomys said in a video published by Bild, which showed a nine-month-old baby among the stranded passengers who included British and German nationals.

One passenger called it a 'scandal' with others demanding to speak to a lawyer, while similar scenes unfolded in Berlin where 77 people were awaiting test results this morning after arriving from Britain last night.

A German government source said restrictions on air travel from Britain could be adopted by the entire 27-member EU and that countries were also discussing a joint response over sea, road and rail links.

Passengers wore face shields and full-body suits as they made their way through Heathrow's terminal 2 this afternoon

Crowds wait at Heathrow Airport after their flight to Dublin was cancelled yesterday evening

People hug each other goodbye outside the departures area at Heathrow Airport's Terminal 2 as some evening flights continue amid chaos from countries banning UK arrivals

Flights to Bogota in Colombia, Hong Kong and Dublin were all cancelled this evening. Pictured: A traveller makes his way into Heathrow's Terminal 5

Heathrow Airport's terminal 2 was very busy this morning, with passengers queuing to get out of the UK

More than 40 countries around the world, including dozens of European nations, have shut down flights from the UK

In other coronavirus developments today:

'Our aim is to prevent the new variant of the virus from entering the region,' Hanover health official Andreas Kranz explained to German news wire DPA.

Ireland has also stopped flights, causing chaos at Heathrow last night as hundreds of people scrambled onto the last flight to Dublin moments before the travel ban took effect.

Travel giant Tui said it had cancelled holidays to Madeira and the Canary Islands up to and including December 24 after Spain and Portugal joined dozens of other countries by imposing their own bans.

The bans mean the already hard-hit travel industry is set to take a further £400million hit.

Paul Charles of travel consultancy The PC Agency, said the £400million cost of the ban was a ‘conservative’ estimate.

He said testing capacity desperately needed to be increased at airports to ensure trips can go ahead if countries demand a negative test before flying.

He said: ‘There is no plan for getting borders opened again, no plan to reassure other countries and get travel bans lifted and no indication of how long the UK may be isolated from so many countries. Where’s the strategy?’

Heathrow Airport also called for testing to be boosted. A spokesman said: ‘Whilst we support steps to contain this new strain, the decisions to restrict international travel again will further damage the national economy and jeopardise jobs.

‘We are a trading, island nation reliant on our doors being open.

‘It is vital that the government maintains its risk-based approach to travel and continues to push for a common international standard for pre-departure testing to ensure people can travel safely and confidently again.’

Boris Johnson sounded the alarm bell over the new strain of the virus on Saturday, when he put London and much of the South East back into lockdown and drastically scaled back Christmas plans for the rest of England.

Believed to be 70 per cent more transmissible, the new strain has been spreading rapidly in the south of England and has already been detected in Italy and the Netherlands.

Department of Health statistics show daily infections have risen 64.7 per cent in a week, with today's figure up from the 20,263 posted last Monday. Deaths are still stable, however, with today's fatality count being 7.3 per cent down on last week's 232.

However, Britain's chief medical adviser Chris Whitty and German health minister Jens Spahn have both said there is no sign that vaccines against Covid-19 will be rendered ineffective by the new strain.

A spokeswoman for the WHO said that 'across Europe, where transmission is intense and widespread, countries need to redouble their control and prevention approaches.'

Travellers, one dressed in a Father Christmas outfit and all wearing face coverings, queue with their luggage in the departures hall at Terminal 2 of Heathrow Airport in west London

Passengers at terminal 2 at Heathrow Airport were left facing lengthy queues today

As of midnight on Sunday flights from the UK to parts of Europe were banned amid fears over a new strain of coronavirus said to be spread even easier than the Covid-19 strain. Pictured, terminal 2 at Heathrow today

Setting up camp: A woman moves a table in a Hanover airport terminal last night after 63 people arriving from Britain had to stay at the arrivals gate overnight as they awaited test results following Germany's travel ban

A passenger sleeps next to their suitcase in Hanover as dozens of British and German passengers spent a miserable night in the terminal as Europe takes drastic action over the mutant virus strain in the UK

Police Scotland will double its presence along border with England with 'highly visible patrols' to deter anyone breaching Covid travel ban but senior officers rule out setting up road blocks to enforce new restrictions

Police Scotland will double its presence along the border with England but will not set up checkpoints and road blocks to enforce Nicola Sturgeon's coronavirus travel restrictions, Scotland's top police chief said today.

Chief Constable Iain Livingstone said that he does not consider draconian curbs on cross-border travel 'appropriate or proportionate' as he doubled the number of officers in the Border areas.

In a statement, the Police Scotland chief said 'highly visible patrols' would instead 'deter anyone who might be considering breaching the coronavirus travel restrictions'.

Indoor mixing will only be allowed on Christmas Day and most of Scotland will be put into the highest level of lockdown from Boxing Day, with a 'strict travel ban' preventing travel to other parts of the UK.

The First Minister last night cut the Christmas amnesty to one day after Boris Johnson plunged London and much of the South East of England into a brutal new Tier 4 lockdown amid rising coronavirus cases caused by a 'mutant' strain of the disease.

A 'strict travel ban' between Scotland and the rest of the UK will remain in place throughout the Christmas holidays while Indoor mixing will only be allowed on Christmas Day. It had been planned to ease the rules for five days, between December 23 and 27.

Tougher level four rules will also apply across mainland Scotland from Boxing Day and the school return date has been pushed back to January 11.

The ban in Germany, which unlike France's restrictions does not include cargo flights, is reportedly set to remain in place until at least December 31, according to the Deutsche Presse-Agentur.

Germany, which holds the rotating EU presidency, also called a special crisis meeting on Monday to co-ordinate the response to the virus news among the bloc's 27 member states.

The Dutch government added that it is monitoring developments and is considering additional measures regarding other modes of transport.

According to the World Health Organisation, the strain has already been identified in Denmark and the Netherlands, while one case was found in Australia.

US authorities are looking 'very carefully' into the virus variant spreading in the United Kingdom, top health officials said Sunday, while indicating that a ban on UK travel was not currently in the cards.

Moncef Slaoui, chief advisor to the government's Operation Warp Speed vaccine program, told CNN's 'State of the Union' that US officials 'don't know yet' if the variant is present in the country.

'We are, of course... looking very carefully into this,' including at the National Institutes of Health and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,' he said.

At the moment, he said, no strain of the virus appears to be resistant to the vaccines available.

'This particular variant in the UK, I think, is very unlikely to have escaped the vaccine immunity,' Slaoui said.

The PM effectively cancelled Christmas for around 18 million people in southern England, including London, on Saturday night by moving swathes of the country into a brutal new Tier 4 regime.

Under the new Tier 4 rules non-essential shops – as well as gyms, cinemas, casinos and hairdressers – have to stay shut and people are limited to meeting one other person from another household in an outdoor public space.

In the rest of England, Christmas easing has been severely curtailed, with households allowed to gather for just one day – Christmas Day itself – rather than the five days previously planned.

The UK has alerted the World Health Organisation that the new variant identified this week appears to be accelerating the spread of Covid-19, saying it accounted for some 60 per cent of the capital's cases.

Viruses mutate regularly, and scientists have found thousands different of mutations among samples of the virus causing Covid-19.

But many of these changes have no effect on how easily the virus spreads or how severe symptoms are.

What are the new Tier 4 rules?

The Tier 4 rules will be essentially the same as the blanket lockdown that England was under in November.

Non-essential retail must close, as well as leisure facilities, and personal care such as hairdressers.

However, places of worship can stay open.

People in other Tiers will be advised not to go into the highest bracket areas, while residents of Tier 4 must not stay overnight in lower infection spots.

Restrictions which forced millions of people across the UK to tear up their Christmas plans may have to remain for 'the next couple of months', Health Secretary Matt Hancock has suggested.

'What is really important is that people not only follow them (the new rules) but everybody in a Tier 4 area acts as if you have the virus to stop spreading it to other people,' Mr Hancock told Sky News's Sophy Ridge On Sunday programme.

Scientists on the Government's New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group have concluded the VUI 202012/01 mutant strain, identified by the Public Health England laboratories at Porton Down, is spreading more quickly.

The Prime Minister was advised of the group's conclusions at a meeting with ministers on the Covid O Committee on Friday evening, and the new regulations were signed off by Cabinet before Saturday's announcement scuppered many people's plans to see family for Christmas.

'We know with this new variant you can catch it more easily from a small amount of the virus being present,' Mr Hancock said.

'All of the different measures we have in place, we need more of them to control the spread of the new variant than we did to control the spread of the old variant. That is the fundamental problem.

'We know that because we know that in November that in the areas where this new variant started, in Kent, the cases carried on rising whereas in the rest of the country the November lockdown worked very effectively.

'It is an enormous challenge, until we can get the vaccine rolled out to protect people. This is what we face over the next couple of months.'

In the rest of England, Christmas easing has been severely curtailed, with households allowed to gather for just one day - Christmas Day itself - rather than the five days previously planned.

Scotland and Wales are also restricting Christmas 'bubbles' to a single day, while people in Northern Ireland have been asked to consider forming a bubble for Christmas Day only.

Wales has also mirrored the Tier 4 restrictions in England by bringing forward Alert Level 4 measures to Sunday, while Scotland has said its travel ban with the rest of the UK will now remain in place right throughout the festive period.

People go through barriers to catch trains at Paddington Station in London. The introduction of the new tier seeks to curb a new more infectious strain of the virus, Boris Johnson explained during a press briefing on Saturday

People wait on the concourse at Paddington Station in London on Saturday as people scramble to get out of London before Tier 4 rules come into power at midnight

The new regulations creating a Tier 4 in England came into force at 7am on Sunday and will be laid before Parliament, which is in recess, on Monday.

The statutory instrument was made at 6am on Sunday, and must be approved by both the House of Commons and House of Lords within 28 days, otherwise the change to the law is reversed as per a process known as the 'made affirmative procedure'.

Which parts of the country are in Tier 4?

Kent

Buckinghamshire

Berkshire

Surrey (excluding Waverley)

The boroughs of Gosport, Havant, Portsmouth, Rother and Hastings

All 32 London boroughs and the city of London.

Bedford, Central Bedfordshire, Milton Keynes, Luton, Peterborough

Hertfordshire

Essex (excluding Colchester, Uttlesford and Tendring).

At a No 10 news conference on Saturday, Mr Johnson said he was taking the actions with a 'heavy heart', but the scientific evidence had left him with no choice.

The announcements prompted a rush to the London train stations and by 7pm on Saturday, there were no tickets available online from several London stations including Paddington, Kings Cross and Euston.

Footage posted on social media showed large crowds at St Pancras station waiting to board trains to Leeds.

The Netherlands is banning flights from the UK for at least the rest of the year in an attempt to make sure the new strain does not reach its shores.

It said it will assess 'with other European Union nations the possibilities to contain the import of the virus from the United Kingdom'.

The announcements came as a hammer blow to many businesses - particularly retailers hoping to pick up some pre-Christmas sales at the end of a torrid year in which they had faced repeated orders to close.

There was also fury among some Conservative MPs after weeks of growing backbench unrest over the return of more and more stringent controls.

Mark Harper, the leader of the Covid Recovery Group of Tory MPs, demanded the recall of Parliament so MPs could debate and vote on the changes for England.

British Medical Association council chair Dr Chaand Nagpaul however welcomed the announcement which, he said, would save lives and help health services cope with 'incredible demand'.

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