Spain will ask travelers who come from Mexico a negative PCR to enter the country

Air Europa and Iberia planes at Barajas airport, Madrid, last Wednesday.SUSANA VERA / REUTERS

Mexico has finally entered the list of countries with high epidemiological risk to travel to Spain.

The Spanish Embassy has published this Tuesday on its social networks that the Ministry of Health will require travelers from Mexico a negative PCR test for covid when they try to enter Spanish territory.

Travel agencies, tourist companies and transport companies must notify all passengers of the obligation of this measure, which will take effect from February 1.

In case of arriving at a Spanish airport without the test, they must undergo an antigen test that must be paid on the spot in addition to the corresponding sanction for non-compliance with sanitary measures.

The measure is implemented in one of the most critical moments of the pandemic in Mexico.

This Monday, the health authorities reported an accumulated more than 150,000 deaths from the coronavirus and more than one million 700,000 infections.

The Latin American country had managed to avoid the list of high-risk countries that Spain implemented on November 23.

Then, the Minister of Health, Salvador Illa, announced that countries with a high accumulated incidence of coronavirus would have to present a negative PCR test carried out in the last 72 hours to enter the country.

In the case of European countries and the Schengen zone, the risk map prepared by the European Center for Disease Control (ECDC) will be followed.

For third parties, the reference will be the basic incidence accumulated per 100,000 inhabitants in 14 days (which must exceed 150 cases per 100,000 inhabitants).

📢‼ ️ IMPORTANT NOTICE:

In accordance with the updated regulations of the Ministry of Health, travelers coming from Mexico PCR will be required to enter Spain from 00:00 on February 1.

pic.twitter.com/AXyDZxXPWF

- Embassy of Spain-Mexico (@EmbEspMex) January 26, 2021

The list of countries with these requirements is updated every week, as long as the measure is in effect.

However, since its implementation, the countries that have entered have remained in it because of the third wave of coronavirus that hits all the continents.

In addition to the negative test, travelers entering Spain by sea, air or land must fill out a health form with information on the last countries visited, symptoms and contact numbers.

Other countries such as the United Kingdom or the United States have implemented similar sanitary filters to contain the arrival of the virus from abroad.

Mexico, on the contrary, remains one of the only countries without restrictions for tourists to enter its borders.

Despite having lost 44% of its visitors in the last year, it was the third most visited country in the world in 2020 thanks to the few bureaucratic impediments in the control lines of the airports as well as its low prices to attract tourism Foreign.