France Adds Mandatory Quarantine for Unvaccinated Arrivals from U.S.

Unvaccinated U.S. citizens will now have to quarantine for 10 days when traveling into France after authorities in that country added the U.S. to its COVID-19 Red List of countries.

While fully vaccinated travelers will be able to travel into France without quarantine as long as they provide proof of vaccination and then proof a negative test before boarding their flight, unvaccinated U.S. travelers will have to self-isolate for 10 days and provide an essential reason to visit.

With the news, the U.S. joins countries including Russia, Turkey, Ukraine, on the Red List, the second-highest advisory category behind Scarlet, a list that includes South Africa, Eswatini, and Lesotho.

Canada remains on France’s Orange List of countries, allowing both fully vaccinated and unvaccinated Canadian citizens to enter the country with no quarantine restrictions as long as they are able to provide proof of a negative test.

France has recently reported its highest numbers of new COVID-19 cases including a record 232,200 cases on Friday, Dec. 31, 2021, and has become the sixth country to report more than 10 million total case numbers. And while the country has also reached a seven-month peak for hospitalizations (almost 19,000 as of Friday), it is still not close to its November 2020 high of almost 34,000.

France has recently added a number of new COVID-19 restrictions, including mandatory mask-wearing in public spaces and mask requirements in the streets in big cities including Paris and Lyon.