Thirteen Greek islands in the Aegean Sea have been marked as dark red on the COVID-19 map compiled by the EU's disease control agency ECDC, which is now advising against all non-essential travel to and from the region.
The upgrade of the risk level on Thursday applies to popular travel destinations such as Mykonos, Santorini and Rhodes.
The Swedish travel companies Tui and Apollo are following the recommendations of Swedish authorities and will continue to fly to the affected islands until the Ministry of Foreign Affairs issues a warning, they tell TT. Tui currently has 4,500 Swedish tourists in Greece.
Greek authorities had hoped to attract tourists back this summer after the loss-making year of 2020. Despite strong visitor numbers in June, it is unclear how the rest of the season will develop.
Dark red zones mark the areas with the worst COVID-19 cases. The aim is to help EU countries decide on testing and quarantine rules for travel. Last week, the risk level for Crete, Greece's largest island, was raised to dark red.
– We are waiting and seeing how the market will react, says Manolis Markopoulos, chairman of the hotel industry organization on Rhodes, after the ECDC's announcement.
