The reaction of the British market to Madeira’s re-entry on the green list of travelers “was immediate and energetic”, causing a “large volume of reservations” that amount to 65,000 seats in July and August, said the Madeiran Tourism Secretary
“It was an immediate reaction, energy with a large volume of reserves,” said Eduardo Jesus to Lusa news agency.
After placing Portugal on the red list, the British Government carried out on 24 June a “positive discrimination” in relation to Madeira, following the steps taken by the regional authorities with the British authorities and operators and due to the favorable epidemiological situation registered in the region.
On that day, the British Government announced that the Madeira archipelago, the Balearic Islands and some of the Caribbean, including Barbados, were added to the “green list” of international travel and exempt from quarantine on arrival in England,
The changes, which also included several UK overseas territories, take effect as early as Wednesday, Transport Minister Grant Shapps revealed.
Madeira’s Tourism Secretary revealed that right after this announcement “there was an operator that is significant for Madeira who said that in a single day he registered the same amount of reservations that he would normally have in a week”.
“Therefore, the market is eager for this possibility of traveling to Madeira and needs security,” he stressed.
The official highlighted that this Portuguese autonomous region has one of the islands [Porto Santo] considered ‘covid free’ and Madeira registers around 60 active cases.
“This security that we have in the region was finally communicated to the English decision-makers so that justice could be done and put Madeira where it needs to be, which is the green corridor”, he argued.
Eduardo Jesus underlined that “with this regained confidence, reservations automatically arise”.
The official mentioned that Madeira currently has 65,000 seats in the British market contracted in direct aviation, with other passengers “who will arrive after stopping at Lisbon and Porto airports”.
He stated that direct operations in the United Kingdom are expected to have 28,000 seats in July and 37,000 in August.
“But only in these, that we are sure of the number of places already made available by the companies that operate between the two territories, is the volume of reservations of this dimension”, he indicated.
Eduardo Jesus stressed that these operations constitute “a very strong contribution”.
“Let’s see if there isn’t any other impediment here that will condition us on this trajectory” of tourism recovery scheduled for the summer, he stressed.
The regional secretary reinforced that the Regional Government will trigger the same “wave” of steps to also try to reverse the decision of the German Government, which placed Portugal on the red list, not making any differentiation based on the security situation registered in Madeira, where it does not the Delta variant, initially detected in India, was also detected.
This decision by Germany is causing successive cancellations of travelers from that country, at a time when the region had “6,200 seats available on planes flying direct from Germany to Madeira that will be lost in the next 14 days”, he said.
According to the latest data released on Saturday regarding the epidemiological situation in the Madeira archipelago by the Regional Directorate of Health, this territory registered seven new cases of infection by SARS-CoV-2 and another 11 recovered patients, with 61 active situations.
This region also maintains the 72 deaths associated with the disease up to the 25 th May, and has four patients admitted to Hospital Dr.Nélio Mendonça, in Funchal, none occupying the Intensive Care Unit.
The covid-19 pandemic has caused more than 3.9 million victims worldwide, resulting from nearly 180 million officially diagnosed cases of infection, according to the balance made by the French agency AFP.
In Portugal, 17,083 people died and 873,051 cases of infection were confirmed, according to the most recent bulletin of the Directorate-General for Health.