(TAN): Four Brazilian tourists landed in jail for faking their Covid-19 results in a bid to enter the country’s Atlantic archipelago of Fernando de Noronha, said the island administration in a statement.
The travellers didn’t meet the Covid-19 entry requirements, so they allegedly changed the date on their documentation — and landed in jail, according to an Associated Press report.
Located about 211 miles off the northeastern coast of Brazil, the isolated island chain, which is a UNESCO World Heritage site and the popular Baia do Sancho beach, reopened to tourists on October 10. Visitors are required to present a negative report for coronavirus with an RT-PCR test within a day of departure, the Brazilian newspaper
Folha de S.Paulo reported.
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Prior to the October opening, Fernando de Noronha had received attention for its unusual containment strategy in which it would only allow visitors who already had Covid-19, Reuters reported. Tourism in the island was completely prohibited in March, even restricting its residents who were on the Brazilian mainland from returning home from April to June.
On Wednesday, October 28, four tourists from Araguaína in the Brazilian state of Tocantins arrived via a private jet and provided their negative test results from October 25 — three days prior to departure, according to a report on Fernando de Noronha’s site. When asked for samples to retest them, the travellers refused and said they
had taken another test on the day of departure and were waiting for the results.
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According to the report, the group presented their new results the next day. But when officials checked with the lab, they found that the date had been altered. The four Brazilians were arrested and jailed, and tested for coronavirus again on October 30.
Since reopening to tourists on October 10, the destination has recorded 16 new coronavirus cases. Globally, Brazil has the third-most cases of Covid-19 after the US and India. According to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, the country has the second-most number of deaths deaths after the US linked to Covid-19.
