As soon as London made official last Thursday that Malta and other tourist spots, such as the Balearic Islands, were on its green list of safe destinations, a condition that exempts them from quarantine when returning to the country, the authorities in Valletta imposed their own conditions on Britons, who have made of the former colony one of their favourite Mediterranean holiday destinations.

A general alert was launched on Wednesday by both political and health authorities across Europe due to the increase in Delta variant cases. In the first case, the strongest voice has been that of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who has made an explicit request from the Bundestag to the other partners of the European Union (EU) to require a quarantine for travellers arriving from countries with high levels of this variant of covid, such as the United Kingdom. "In our country, if you come from the UK you have to quarantine [for fourteen days], and this is not the case in all European countries. This is what I would like to see", she said.

The Delta variant of covid-19, which originated in India, is spreading through Europe at a good pace and the Catalan authorities estimate that in the coming weeks it will displace the Alpha variant, which originated in Kent. In fact, community transmission has already been detected and in two weeks it has doubled its incidence to stand right now above 20%, according to data from the Department of Health. The new strain is presented with a different symptomatology that makes infected people confuse it with a "bad cold" and do not go so quickly to medical services. This, added to the fact that it is twice as contagious, raises fears that it will soon become the predominant strain.

The epidemiological evolution supports the "rational" de-escalation that the Catalan Government has been carrying out over the past few weeks, which will be accelerated with the reopening of nightlife as of Monday. But the threat of the Delta variant (originating in India), which the data indicate that it is more transmissible and is partially inmune to vaccines, calls for caution. "For weeks we have been explaining that this variant is gaining ground and we know it will end up being dominant," Masó admitted. Last week this mutation represented 12% of the cases analysed and this week is already around 20%.