At the end of 2022, in the Daily Sceptic, I published the first survey of which countries still required COVID-19 vaccines for entry. There followed two updates in January and April of 2023. Finally, with the conclusion that we were ‘nearly there’ I published the last in the series in May 2023.
As we embark on 2025, and now that Covid is all over bar the shouting – and the inquiries, the backlog of NHS appointments, the vaccine harmed and sectors of the economy that may never recover – I thought it might be worthwhile checking to see if any of the countries that maintained Covid vaccine requirements in the middle of 2023 were still doing so.
I am pleased to say that the outcome is very positive with very few countries even mentioning Covid vaccines in their entry requirements. There is the usual range of countries which maintain Yellow Fever vaccinations and the Marshall Islands and the Solomon Islands have requirements regarding MMR or measles vaccination. The former says: “To enter the Marshall Islands, you must show proof children aged four and under have had the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine”; and the latter says: “You must have a certificate to prove you’ve had a measles vaccination if you’re travelling from Australia, New Zealand, American Samoa, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, Kiribati, Papua New Guinea or the Philippines (excluding transit passengers).”
Mozambique says: “There are no COVID-19 testing or vaccination requirements for travellers entering Mozambique”; while Palau, strangely, says: “There are no COVID-19 testing or vaccination requirements for travellers entering Palau, although the entry form will ask whether you are vaccinated.”
Myanmar says: “Travellers will be expected to complete a short health declaration in relation to the mpox [monkeypox] virus on arrival.” If anyone is brave enough to go to Myanmar he is unlikely, if asked, to affirm that he has mpox just as nobody in the history of air travel has ever responded ‘Yes’ to the question “Are you carrying any packages for anyone?” or said ‘No’ to the question “Did you pack your bags yourself?” In any case, as a recent article in the New Humanitarian suggests, the Myanmar junta may have more important things to think about than mpox.
So, Covid vaccine related travel restrictions are largely a thing of the past. But there is always one joker in every pack. And the joker in relation to Covid vaccine related travel restrictions is Turkmenistan, which says: “While Turkmenistan doesn’t require COVID-19 vaccination, all travellers must undergo a COVID-19 test upon arrival, which costs about 31 US dollars.”
It is hard to figure out why any country would still be requiring a Covid test for entry, but it probably boils down to someone in the Turkmenistan equivalent of the NHS over-ordering Covid tests. Described by Wikipedia as a country “widely criticised for its poor human rights, including for its treatment of minorities, and its lack of press and religious freedoms” it is also hard to imagine that too many people will be queuing up at the Turkmenistan border to shell out $31 for a Covid test.
Dr. Roger Watson is Professor of Nursing at Saint Francis University, Hong Kong SAR, China. He has a PhD in biochemistry. He writes in a personal capacity.
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Packham is a dangerous BBC mouthpiece who is extremely ill-educated in matters of climate and certainly wholly incapable of discussing the subject in a rational and scientific manner. His ability to link “climate change” to birds in the garden is nothing but 21st century voodoo with him as the lead shaman. The miserable specimen that he is he referred to this site as The Daily Septic which neatly sums up the heights of childishness that he aspires to and indeed has attained.
Packham is a virus on the planet although I am not sure he is even as infectious as that laughable con that was the C1984. Hopefully he is up to date with his jabs and is fully boosted.
He is known to be autistic, which is a neurological problem, and yes, there is a degree of opportunism about that on both sides of the coin. Just doing what a sick man tells you what to do might not be wise.
Packham claims to be an autist because that’s a current fashion. But autist making a career as TV star is a contradictio in adiecto, more so for this kind of TV star. After watching the clip, it became pretty clear that he’s an aggressive pathological dickhead who’s extremely self-confident in his dealings with other people. That pretty much makes him an anti-autist. Could be a borderline guy. This would fit the behaviour.
Exactly
What evidence is there, other than his word, to prove that Packham is autistic. It’s very fashionable to self declare, is he trans too?
Not wearing a shirt like that!!!
I think he gets his t-shirts from the local clothes bank!
Send him to Siberia in winter without clothing, fuel, food or shelter. See if he still feels there’s a climate emergency.
Or as we remember in that old pop song about Star Trek “it’s worse than that he’s dead Jim”——–What is particularly dangerous about the BBC and the likes of this buffoon Packham is that apparently about 70 % of people are getting their news from the BBC. So it is even worse than the fact that Packham is a “dangerous BBC mouthpiece”
If the BBC keeps confirming ‘the truth’ about the Climate Problem, and banning any contradictory views, and the Government keep introducing laws to deal with it, how can anyone with or without a PhD (in anything
) have anything credible to say that contradicts the agenda, let alone appear on TV to present their case?
Yes, for example, I know the poor performance of windfarm generated Electricity can be explained with A’ level Physics (1971) course material, but it is apparent that few have attained that level of understanding, let alone any at the BBC. Or are they scared to tell the Truth.
And this deficiency must be widespread, across the West, otherwise we wouldn’t be in the predicament that we are in.
A cynic might observe that the recent flooding in Dubai had something to do with the underlying design of certain things, such as not investing in adequate drainage. Might have looked good financially, but they failed to consider the real world risk and, err, take out insurance, in effect.
Re. Packham, it is well known that he is abnormal health wise, being somewhat down the scale on the autism spectrum. Must have an effect on his output, and the efficacy of it all.
These days a declaration of autism is a bit like a declaration of ADHD and is grossly abused by many “sufferers.” I do not wish to insult genuinely autistic people but with people like Packham I believe it should be taken with a large pinch of salt. He is considered well enough to host BBC propoganda programmes and is doubtless paid stupid money for doing so, I therefore am entitled to call out his lies and nonsense.
That part of the World has wadis, which are deep, wide, usually dry, water courses in the sand, formed over time by sudden, torrential rain.
It is generally recommended not to camp or walk along wadis which can suddenly become flooded, raging torrents of water.
Whilst heavy rainfall is not common, it obviously does happen from time to time, enough to have made wadis permanent features of the desert landscape.
Dubai – needs to invest in storm drains.
It’s a weird city, seen from above. Some years ago, I went to and from Karachi via Dubai, just to change planes there, so had a look at it from the air.
And maybe do a lot less cloud seeding!
https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2024/04/17/uae-denies-cloud-seeding-took-place-before-severe-dubai-floods.html
Having catogorily stated that it wasn’t caused by cloud seeding we now know what the cause was, cloud seeding!
Neil Ferguson is not a Mathematician.
Correct but he identifies as one.
That’s all right then, isn’t?
Packham is such a nasty ignorant Pratt. Proud to contribute to this publication.
Blimey Mr Sutton, you are me! My own graduate research paper was called “Some aspects of the Infrared Dissociation Spectrum of the H3+ Molecule Ion”, and I spent most of the time getting holes burnt in me with the laser, or writing a shonky Monte Carlo simulation about as reliable as Prof Fergusson’s model.
Now for something you already know:
Packham is a whey faced ninny and well known criminal. He encourages law breaking ‘eco-activists’.
‘Encouraging or assisting a crime is itself a crime in English law, by virtue of the Serious Crime Act 2007. It is one of the inchoate offences of English law.’
If he had his way, he would destroy the entire ground nesting bird population of Great Britain.
Packham and his ilk are already responsible for the almost complete destruction of upland ground nesting birds in Wales and on Exmoor, Dartmoor during my lifetime.
How are they responsible? They are responsible through their lobbying for the Hunting Act and the protection of various very common corvids, raptors and mustelids.
Britain has well over 250,000 birds of prey, well over 350,000 foxes and over 500,000 badgers.
Packham also makes a great deal of noise about a perceived shortage of hen harriers. Hen harriers are upland ground nesting birds!
An excellent study using cameras showed that the main predator of hen harriers are…..foxes!
https://robyorke.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Skye-harrier-nest-predation-report.pdf
Well, stuff my old boots, the man is not just a criminal but a dim and narcissistic nincompoop…..
But you already knew that!
Great comment and a different aspect that we often forget. —–Apparently the Red Kite in Germany has been virtually wiped out because of the 40,000 wind turbines in a country where most of Europe’s Red Kites live and breed.
About 12 000 years ago Britain was covered with an ice sheet, freezing cold, and not an island but connected to Europe by a land bridge because sea levels were 40metre lower than today.
Now Britain is not covered in ice, is reasonably warm is an island due to 12 000 years slow, incremental non-linear natural process of warming caused by multiple factors, nothing to do with Mankind.
It is not logical to image that process stopped just because we started burning fossil fuels. It is not ‘science’ to imagine the colossal natural process that warmed up the climate system of the planet, can be relegated to a bit part by Mankind’s activity or stopped.
By natural process that warming will continue for thousands more years, moving the climate system to a tropical condition over most of the surface – as has happened repeatedly in the past, before reversing back to an ice age. Nothing Mankind does or doesn’t do can stop that.
Facts: the actual rate of any temperature change cannot be observed (this is admitted by the so-called scientists), and therefore cannot be measured or compared. Climate cannot be observed or measured so cannot be compared.
”Scientists” have contrived the ‘Global Mean Temperature Anomaly’ cobbled together from average temperatures from only a small area of the Earth’s surface, manipulated with mathematical formulæ to produce numbers – not temperatures – accurate to two decimal places but with a margin of error wide enough for the safe passage of a coach and horses, which are purported to demonstrate ‘global warming’.
It is all fiction.
Yes exactly, and it is impossible for all the government funded data adjusters to not know any of the points you just made. But when there is this symbiotic relationship between government and science and who pays the piper calls the tune then facts are conveniently put to one side.
I have stated many many times on this platform and others that computer models are not science. Putting assumptions, speculations and guesses where many of the parameters in your model are either poorly understood or totally unknown is just a computer game. It is NOT science. Even the most basic parameter in the climate model ECS (Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity) which determines what effect increasing CO2 levels will have on temperatures is UNKNOWN. It is just guessed at, and all of the models just assume the correct number for ECS is high. Is it any wonder then that all of the climate models have so far been WRONG. I recall the words of a lead author at the IPCC many years ago (von Storch) who was honest enough to admit. “In 5 years time we will have to realise that there must be something seriously wrong with our models as a 20 year pause in global warming does not exist in any of the models”. He was referring to the fact that there had just been 15 years of virtually no statistical warming since 1998. —–Now the main problem we have with this issue that is really politics masquerading as science is that our mainstream News programs are pushing a particular narrative that “science” knows exactly what is happening with climate change and they also know what the solution is. The worst offender is ofcourse the BBC, who refuse to even contemplate that anything other than the IPCC version of reality can possibly be true.. ——This is therefore not NEWS. It is activism and we are paying the license fee to fund our own brainwashing.
Close connections to the oil industry obviously means Own cars which aren’t electric.
But that’s really completely besides the point. The oil industry may well publish something that’s actually right. This would need to be determined for each individual case.
So this is the eminent scientist who got a degree in zoology and couldn’t hack it on a PhD course and became a cameraman’s assistant.
Chris Packham is such a self-righteous, narcissistic, pompous pillock I struggle to believe anyone takes him seriously.
We couldn’t be too much poorer, than Packham and these morons try to make us.
“It’s working backwards from an event and showing that it can happen under some scenario.”
Haha! This happens or used to (I can’t believe things have changed and if they have it’s probably got worse) all the time in business. “What answer do you want?” “Okay we”ll sort the figures to agree with the decision you want to make!”
Job done!!
“track record of presenting demented predictions”
Will keep me chortling for the day…
If the climate computer attribution models actually worked they would be able to predict weather/climate events before they occurred, not after.