In total, officials eased travel restrictions for 61 countries. The US Centres for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) lowered countries such as France, Spain and Italy into level three, which means fully-vaccinated passengers may go to these areas.
Travellers from the US can visit the UK but must self-isolate for ten days on arrival. However, most passengers from the UK are still banned from travelling to the US.
Although the UK is listed as a level three by the CDC, under a presidential decree introduced last March, non-US citizens who have been in the UK in the last 14 days cannot enter the country unless a specific exemption applies.
The health authority said that it had updated its criteria to “better differentiate countries with severe outbreak situations from countries with sustained, but controlled, Covid-19 spread”.
Other countries that saw their ratings lowered include Ecuador, Philippines, South Africa, Canada, Mexico and Russia.
Japan also saw its travel rating lowered to allow vaccinated passengers to travel in the run-up to the Tokyo Olympics in July.
On May 24th, the state department had issued a warning against the country, citing a new wave of Covid-19 cases.
