The European Commission is working on a plan for European countries to reopen their borders this summer. The hope is that some tourism will be able to take place, NU.nl reports.
When the coronavirus crisis began, European countries shut their borders to one another in a rather haphazard way, deciding individually when they would do so. The European Commission is hoping that, by coming up with guidelines for the process, they can make the reopening of borders a little more organised.
Countries may open to other countries with a similar risk profile
They are doing this by allowing countries to reopen to other countries with a similar risk profile. Data from the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) is used to decide this. Countries must reopen to all countries with a similar risk profile, and cannot work on individual agreements with each other, as France and Great Britain seem to have been doing.
Greece and Portugal hope to reopen for tourists
For countries like Portugal and Greece, who have not been hit badly by the coronavirus crisis so far, and which rely on tourism for a significant proportion of their GDP, there is a clear incentive to reopen for tourism. For other countries which have been harder hit, a holiday at home is the plan.
Do you expect to be able to go on holiday this year? Let us know your predictions in the comments below.
Feature Image: Carlos Andres Rivera Castillo/Pexels