The difference this time around, is vaccines.
Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said that there will be a phased return to international travel in the coming months but warned it will not be international travel “as we used to know it”.
He said there would likely be a lot more steps to international travel including proof of vaccination and testing.
However, he confirmed the Government is set to miss the target of 80% of the population being offered a vaccine by the end of June due to supply issues.
Although he did say he expects 2.5 million of the population to be fully vaccinated by the end of July.
“Vaccines are effective and that’s one thing we’re increasingly confident of is that the vaccines – particularly when you’re fully vaccinated – they are effective against all variants,” Varadkar told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland.
“The difficulty we have is that there are still a lot of people in Ireland not vaccinated and that’s why we’re going to be relatively cautious on international travel.
“Every week we delay [the return of international travel], 300,000 more people are either vaccinated or fully vaccinated.
“So, just waiting a month, that’s 1.2 million more vaccines and I think people will understand the sense behind that.”
Varadkar also confirmed that all European Union countries will be removed from the mandatory hotel quarantine list.
But the common travel area with Britain will not be restored just yet due to the presence of the Indian variant in Britain, which has now become the dominant variant in the UK.
He said that while there was a chance of a fourth wave of Covid-19, the important thing would be the “impact” that wave would have on us.
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