Portugal limits UK travel, stops classes amid virus surge

Portugal’s battle to contain the surging COVID-19 delta variant has led it to put the United Kingdom on its red list for travel and cancel school classes in the southern Algarve region, its main tourist attraction

LISBON, Portugal -- Portugal’s battle to contain the surging COVID-19 delta variant has prompted it to put the United Kingdom on its red list for travel, speed up vaccinations in Lisbon and cancel school classes in the southern Algarve region, its main tourist destination. Portugal has in recent days been reporting the highest number of daily new coronavirus cases since February. Though hospitals are comfortably coping with new virus admissions, officials say the increase of about 30% over the past week was a worrying trend. On Monday, the number of coronavirus patients in hospital surpassed 500 for the first time since early April. The country's 14-day cumulative COVID-19 case notification rate per 100,000 people, meanwhile, rose to 162 — the highest officially recorded since early March.