LONDON – About 1,000 British soldiers were spending Christmas Day trying to clean up a huge backlog of truck drivers trapped in southeastern England after France briefly closed its border with the UK and then demanded coronavirus testing amid to fears of a new, apparently more contagious variant of the virus.
Even as 4,000 international truck drivers spent another day tucked into their taxis, some progress was evident on Friday, with traffic around the Dover harbor on the English Channel moving in an orderly direction towards the extra ferries that were put on the short crossing to Calais, in northern France.
The military was directing traffic and helping with a mass testing program for drivers, who are expected to turn negative to enter France. French firefighters were also enlisted to help the military test drivers for the coronavirus.
Britain’s Department of Transportation officials said all but three of the 2,367 coronavirus tests performed so far were negative.
France closed its border for 48 hours with the United Kingdom last Sunday, after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said that a variant of the virus that is 70% more transmissible is leading to the rapid spread of infections in London and surrounding areas. As a result, the capital and many other parts of England have seen tight blocking restrictions and family vacation meetings canceled.
Most of the tests are being conducted in a disabled airfield at Manston Airport, 20 miles from Dover. Free food and drink was being sent to the arrested truck drivers and more than 250 portable toilets were placed in Manston, with another 32 placed along the congested M20 road.
“The most comforting thing is that food is arriving in Manston, and I have to say a big thank you to everyone who offered to help drivers withstand cold conditions in the days leading up to Christmas,” said Duncan Buchanan, from Great- Brittany Road Transport Association.
The mood among the arrested drivers appeared to be mostly optimistic, especially compared to the anger earlier this week about the situation and the lack of facilities.
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“I know it has been difficult for many drivers confined to their taxis at this precious time of year, but I assure you that we are doing our best to take you home,” said British Transport Secretary Grant Shapps.
The virus has been responsible for more than 1.7 million confirmed deaths worldwide, including about 70,000 in Britain, the second highest number of deaths in Europe, behind Italy.
On Saturday, Britain is extending stricter blocking restrictions to more areas, while officials are trying to contain the spread of the new variant. In the past two days, the UK recorded its two highest numbers of daily infections, just under 40,000. This is fueling fears that the country’s beloved National Health Service will face acute capacity problems in its hospitals soon and thousands of others will die of the virus.
In a video message to the nation, Johnson said that this Christmas “was not about gifts, or turkey or brandy butter”, but about hope, in the form of coronavirus vaccines being distributed and more vaccines being developed.
“We know that there will be people alive next Christmas, people we love, alive next Christmas precisely because we made the sacrifice and we don’t celebrate normally this Christmas,” said the Prime Minister.
Johnson said on Thursday that more than 800,000 people in Britain received the first dose of the vaccine developed by the American pharmaceutical company Pfizer and the German biotechnology company BioNTech. The United Kingdom was the first country in the world to approve the vaccine and started inoculation for healthcare professionals and people over 80 on December 8.