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A day after a ban on travelling to Svalbard was announced for anyone under the coronavirus quarantine – when even top officials and airport security officials at airports were unsure if the ban applied to permanent residents as well as tourists, and what few countries were exempt – The Governor of Svalbard announced at Saturday the ban applies to everybody who’s returned from a country outside Norway other than Sweden and Finland since Feb. 27.
“People who arrive Norway from anywhere other than Sweden and Finland are going to quarantine on the mainland,” the governor announced in a statement. “In other words, residents in Svalbard are not going to travel ‘home’ to Svalbard until after the quarantine period.”
However, an exemption was also enacted today for people in certain critical public occupations such as health care and transportation. Gov. Kjerstin Askholt said the specifics of how the policy will be enforced against those who must return to the mainland and who is exempt are still being determined.
“I don’t have the solution yet,” she said.
