Dutch authorities have placed a couple in isolation in a hospital after their attempt to flee from a hotel where Covid-19 positive passengers from South Africa were quarantined, officials said on Monday , judging the blow "not really smart".
The fugitives, a 30-year-old Spaniard and a 28-year-old Portuguese woman, were arrested Sunday by Dutch border police on a plane at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol.
“We heard that people had left the hotel, unfortunately, even though they had been told to stay there.
So we had to take action and arrest them, ”Robert van Kapel, spokesperson for the border police at Schiphol airport, told AFP.
“Now they are in a place where they are in isolation, in a hospital,” added Mr. van Kapel.
They are "the subject of an investigation for a possible crime"
The hotel near the airport is where most of the 61 people who tested positive for coronavirus after arriving on two flights from South Africa on Friday are in quarantine.
The incident came after Dutch authorities announced that 13 out of 61 people who tested positive were infected with the new Omicron variant.
One of the runaway couple had tested positive for the coronavirus, although it was not clear if he was infected with the new variant.
The other had tested negative but had chosen to stay with his or her partner.
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A spokeswoman for the mayor of the local municipality of Haarlemmermeer confirmed that the couple were "in a hospital in the Netherlands" and said they were now "under investigation for a possible crime".
“These people were invited for the first time to stay at the hotel, then they were asked for a second time, urgently, now they are in isolation.
What they did was not really smart, ”spokeswoman Petra Faber told AFP.
“In the Netherlands, it is not illegal to be outdoors when you have tested positive for Covid.
But getting on a plane knowing you are is another story.
"