Merkel aide: Decision on mandatory coronavirus testing for holidaymakers likely soon

BERLIN (Reuters) – Chancellor Angela Merkel’s chief of staff said health ministers would on Monday discuss the possibility of obliging returning holidaymakers to take a coronavirus test as he expressed concern about a rise in infections in Germany.

“I think that we’ll find a solution relatively quickly,” Helge Braun told reporters, adding that it was necessary to act now to bring infection numbers down, since it would be harder to control the disease’s spread in autumn and winter.

On Friday, Spahn and his regional counterparts from Germany’s 16 federal states agreed that authorities would offer returning holidaymakers free voluntary tests that, if negative, would excuse returnees from going into mandatory quarantine.