Top medical expert Dr Gabriel Scally has called on the Government to scrap the “half a quarantine” system and roll it out in full to save lives.
There are tensions in Government over extending the list of countries with Health Minister Stephen Donnelly and Transport Minister Eamon Ryan in favour of expanding it.
A further 26 nations were added last week, but Tanaiste Leo Varadkar and Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney are opposed to increasing it.
Dr Scally, who backs countries such as France, Germany and Italy being included, said: “It is the logical and in fact the only sensible thing to do.
“I’ll tell you where we are now, we are in a situation where there are variants around the world that are extraordinarily dangerous, potentially setting us back enormously.
“And the reason for restricting international travel until we get the virus much more under control is some of these variants can dodge the vaccine, some of them are much more infectious, some of them are much more lethal and keeping the variants out is absolutely crucial.
“There’s little point in a country vaccinating and getting the numbers down and then you’re prepared to welcome new variants to your shore that will undo all of that hard effort.
Dr Scally also insisted there is international evidence which suggests countries that have kept the virus under control have performed better economically.
He added: “This continuing will we, won’t we, delay and dither about putting in place public health measures to protect the population is really bad for the health of the population but it’s also extraordinarily bad for the economy.”
“I’m amazed about the discussion about depending on where your passport is issued you might or not be a risk in terms of bringing in the virus, bringing in new variants or that there should be widespread exemptions for people coming from countries with a lot of Irish people living in them or whatever,” he told RTE Radio1’s Today with Claire Byrne show.
“It’s a very particular way of dealing with managed isolation.
“You can’t have half a quarantine where lots of people can avoid it.”
Dr Scally, who was asked about the proposal to let people out of mandatory quarantine after five days if they have a negative PCR test, added: “I think that’s up for debate.
“There are places around the world that do operate with perhaps a negative test before travel, a test on the first day of arrival and a test five days later.
“It will depend on the evidence we have about the variants that are potentially coming into the country.
“But the safest way to do it is to do it properly and keep people in managed isolation for at least 10-to-14 days.”
