ZURICH (Reuters) - Swiss health authorities have added mainland Spain to its list of countries from which people arriving must enter a 10-day quarantine that aims to help curb the spread of the new coronavirus, they said on Wednesday.
Patrick Mathys, head of crisis management for the federal public health office, told a briefing in Bern the measure would take effect from Saturday.
The measure excludes Spain's Balearic and Canary Islands.
"For the first time we did not put an entire country on the list, but rather those areas where we can say the geographical separation and above all the passenger flows -- and that is decisive -- can really be differentiated," Mathys said.
The Swiss move is the latest blow to Spain's economy, which is already in a steep recession and depends on tourism for 12.3% of its economic output.
Other countries added to the list https://www.bag.admin.ch/bag/en/home/krankheiten/ausbrueche-epidemien-pandemien/aktuelle-ausbrueche-epidemien/novel-cov/empfehlungen-fuer-reisende/quarantaene-einreisende.html of countries whose COVID-19 infection rates warrant quarantine were Equatorial Guinea, Bahamas, Sint Maarten, Singapore, Romania, and Sao Tome and Principe, Mathys said.
Russia, Azerbaijan and the United Arab Emirates were removed from the list.
(Reporting by Michael Shields, editing by John Revill)
