The latest traffic light update saw Canada added to the green list but Thailand has been bumped down to red.
Along with Canada, Finland, the Azores, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Lithuania are all moving to the low risk green list as of early Mobday 30 August.
Thailand and Montenegro were downgraded to the UK government’s red list, which is a blow for Phuket’s ‘sandbox’ tourism scheme, which allows quarantine-free entry.
Travellers returning from green list countries do not have to quarantine but from red list countries a mandatory hotel quarantine is necessary.
Although designated green list from Monday, Canada currently has a ban on British nationals.
Travel industry reaction was lukewarm
Airlines UK, said the ‘small number of green destinations’ makes international travel ‘expensive, burdensome and uncertain’ in comparison to other nations.
"Too many families are having to look over their shoulders for rule changes and pay through the nose for tests, with no sign from government that this will change," the trade group said.
Charlie Cornish, CEO of Manchester Airports Group said the changes will make ‘little difference’ to the stalled recovery of the travel industry.
"Europe’s stronger recovery has been driven by the removal of testing requirements on vaccinated travellers. Unless the UK also removes the need for people with full immunity to take these tests, we will continue to squander the advantage of our world-leading vaccination programme."
"The UK’s economic recovery remains far behind our more pragmatic European neighbours. We also need to urgently end the uncertainty caused by the constant threat of changes to countries’ traffic light status," said Sean Doyle, British Airways’ Chairman and CEO.
"Our green list is much smaller than that of the US and EU."
