A fuming dad says he is being "imprisoned" in a quarantine hotel with his family because of mistake with their return flights from Egypt.
Hassan Shaaban, from Halewood, Merseyside, went on holiday to visit family in the African country which is on the red list.
Government advice states that you "should not travel to red list countries or territories" for holidays and if you have to travel there, you will need to pay for a 10-day stay at a government-managed quarantine hotel when you return.
So to avoid being quarantined Hassan, who is a consultant surgeon, and his French wife decided to also spend 10 days in France with her family, before heading back to Liverpool.
But after their initial flight from Egypt to France was cancelled, Hassan and his family needed to book onto another flight departing some hours later.
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The flight change meant the family only spent nine days and 22 hours in France and not the full 10 days as initially planned.
This meant the family were forced to quarantine for 10 days in a hotel in Birmingham - at a cost of £5,000 - when they landed in Manchester.
The 57-year-old told the Liverpool Echo : "We haven't seen family since covid for a long time and my mum was ill so we decided to go.
"We went to see my family in Egypt, and then went to France to see the other half of the family and we stayed there 10 days to comply with the amber country regulation.
"We landed in Manchester from France on Thursday and the border officers said we spent 9 days 22 hours in France, not the full 10 days.
"That only happened because we had a problem with our initial flight and needed to book another flight hours later.
"So they said ‘this means you've been in Egypt for the last 10 days’ so we have been forced to quarantine for 11 days."
The dad-of-three Hassan said the conditions his family are being put in are 'worse than prison' and he worries for the mental health of his 11-year-old son and twin nine-year-old daughters in isolation.
"Our mental health is badly affected and I’m really worried about imprisoning three kids in a room," he said.
"Forcing us to be here is horrible.
"In my mind it’s for no reason , we are all negative and for the sake of two hours that we spent in the airport waiting before we got sent to the quarantine hotel anyway."
He added: "I cannot explain the conditions we are in. If you talk about this quarantine, first of all it is inhumane. It is worse than a prison.
"We have only to walk for 15 minutes, two or three times a day in an empty car park which is about 30 metre by 10 to 15 metre , that's all the exercise we have.
"Can you imagine with three kids who want to run around, it is child cruelty. Somebody needs to think about what's going on, it's madness."
Now that he is in quarantine, the consultant surgeon has needed to cancel appointments at the hospital and his son will also miss his first few days of secondary school.
Hassan and his wife are both fully vaccinated and all of the family have provided multiple negative Covid tests.
He said: "I’m a doctor, I know what I’m talking about, there's no way we need to quarantine these days.
"We've done the tests, they're all negative, we’re both fully vaccinated.
"The law has been interpreted wrong because even if you come into contact with a positive case now you don’t need to quarantine when you’re fully vaccinated."
Hassan is now seeking legal advice and wants to appeal to any local solicitors who can help.
