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U.S. adds 116 countries to its ‘Do Not Travel’ advisory list

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Reporting by David Shepardson

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. New Tab , opens new tab

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In divided Iran, president's death met by muted mourning and furtive celebration

Iran proclaimed five days of mourning for President Ebrahim Raisi on Monday, though the muted atmosphere revealed little of the spectacular public grief that has accompanied the deaths of other senior figures in the Islamic Republic's 45-year history.

Which Countries Does The US Warn Against Travel To? (Full List)

The list of counties which the U.S. State Department advises against travel to increased from 34 to 151. Which countries are on the “do not travel” list?’

May 11, 2021 UPDATE: The United Kingdom has dropped from Category 4 to Category 3 while Israel has dropped from Category 4 to Category 2 .

State Department “Do Not Travel” List

The State Department divides nations into four categories:

• Level 1 – “exercise normal precautions” – 0 country
• Level 2 – “exercise increased caution” – 17 countries  
• Level 3 – “reconsider travel” – 41 countries
• Level 4 – “do not travel” – 151 countries

Here’s the list of Level 4 countries , which Americans are urged to avoid right now:

• Afghanistan
• Antigua and Barbuda
• Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba
• Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Burkina Faso
• Burma (Myanmar)
• Central African Republic
• Cote d’Ivoire
• Czech Republic
• Democratic Republic of the Congo
• Dominican Republic
• French Guiana
• French West Indies
• Guinea-Bissau
• Liechtenstein
• Netherlands
• North Korea (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea)
• North Macedonia
• Papua New Guinea
• Philippines
• Republic of the Congo
• Saint Lucia
• Saint Vincent and The Grenadines
• Sao Tome and Principe
• Saudi Arabia
• Solomon Island
• South Africa
• South Sudan
• Switzerland
• The Bahamas
• Timor Leste
• Trinidad and Tobago
• Turkmenistan
• Turks and Caicos Islands
• United Arab Emirates

The State Department notes the updated list “reflects an adjustment in the State Department’s Travel Advisory system to rely more on existing epidemiological assessments.”

But no further explanation is given as to how countries were placed in which category.

Bhutan has also lost its Category 1 status and is now in Category 2 status.

The U.S. is warning against travel to 151 countries, up from just 34 countries in late April. While this list is not a travel ban, the practical effect of this latest update will be to slow international travel. It also suggests that the United States will not be re-opened to citizens of the European Union in May, as has been rumored.

About Author

Matthew Klint

Matthew is an avid traveler who calls Los Angeles home. Each year he travels more than 200,000 miles by air and has visited more than 135 countries. Working both in the aviation industry and as a travel consultant, Matthew has been featured in major media outlets around the world and uses his Live and Let's Fly blog to share the latest news in the airline industry, commentary on frequent flyer programs, and detailed reports of his worldwide travel.

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17 comments.

I would rather travel to most of the countries in the list than travel to NYC, California, Portland or Seattle.

The State Department…

Why do we give them such a large budget? They bungled Korea for 70 years. Meanwhile. DENNIS RODMAN was able to make a diplomatic breakthrough. Think about that, we are listening to an agency who has less success than DENNIS RODMAN. Maybe they should try and actually solve problems instead of merely managing them, which allows them to justify their 6 figure government salaries.

And we should listen to their advice on where to travel?

They are being realistic: opening for travel is way more distant than most people believe ( …or want to believe…); in Churchillian terms we might have seen “the end of the beginning “ but that’s about all. The huge ethical, political and logistical issue remain: how to ensure there is sufficient vaccination around the world to give a reasonable level of safety PRIOR to the need for booster shots …because ,in the absence of virtually universal vaccination, the outbreaks will come again and again. Everyone’s worst nightmare is happening now in India: people dying in the streets outside hospitals, not a ventilator to be had ( and this in the world’s biggest producer of vaccines). Yet still some people will clamour for premature reopening of borders, mostly because they want to go on vacation ( although more often than not they couch this in economic terms: as if the world turns on the need for some road warrior/points junkie to have a ‘face to face’ meeting in Paris. Total BS). And usually preface this self-serving desire by quoting meaningless stats about recovery rates/ comparisons with seasonal flu. It’s beyond pukeworthy.

Stop blaming vacationers. Had their not been political rallies and riots, infection rate would be 70% lower, both in India and US.

Based on the invisible criteria the USA should also be Level 4 and domestic travel restricted. Here in the UK (level 4) I would say we are in a lot better shape than America. This is all meaningless political theatre.

I believe the term is virtue signaling. If one mask is good, two masks means you are just that much more serious about protecting others. When recommending against domestic travel just doesn’t feel good enough, toss in most foreign jurisdictions to maintain equity. If you are smart, you’ll understand this is what you must claim you are doing to maintain acceptable conversations at in-person gatherings with your vaccinated peers. If you don’t listen, well, you aren’t part of the group of people that are important anyway. If this was actually about public health, there would be a related increase in bans on flights from high risk areas – looking at you India. So much for following the science.

What a complete joke. This is just more “woke” political nonsense.

Thanks for ruining summer, Uncle Joe and Fauci

Liechtenstein is on the list… WHERE IT BELONGS!!!

This list is quite ridiculous it just doesn’t make sense…

Level 2: Palau, South Korea, Thailand (really? Palau has zero cases since the start of the pandemic and compare to South Korea that has 500-700+ daily cases and Thailand over 1000 cases per day)

Level 3: Iceland, Hong Kong, New Zealand, Taiwan, Australia. All these countries has way less cases per day than South Korea or Thailand. Hong Kong about 0 to 3 local cases per day, same with the others mostly imported.

Level 4: Macau? (Is this a joke? Since the pandemic Macau only had a total of 49 cases and 0 deaths)

It’s so freaking hypocritical that Trump endured such criticism for limiting travel (was called racist, and so on), then the (deep) State Department has the gall to add ONE HUNDRED FIFTY countries to their list?

“Do as I say, not as I do”

FINALLY someone recognizes those evil ass Canadians for what they are. Right up where they belong with North Korea, Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia and Yemen. Build that wall Eh!

This is a ridiculous list and only encourages non compliance with this and other “guidelines”. Why create such a distrust in government by going fro 34 to 134 in 24 hours? How about a little nuance?

Forget Australia. The national budget, delivered today, says borders will not begin to reopen until mid 2022. In economic terms that’s not a net loss, as Australians used to spend AUD20 billion more on overseas travel p.a. than total receipts from incoming tourists. But it’s a TOTAL PITA !

Listen up, folks. Here’s the deal. We will encourage international travel once Kam and I are ready to declare victory over this virus. So just sit tight for another 18 months and we’ll have this licked by the mid-terms.

What the bureaucrats at State Department and CDC don’t understand, is that with each passing day this crap continues to go on, they lose credibility with the people, at least those who pay attention to this stuff and who can think for themselves. I’m in Ethiopia this week, having a great time. I had a great flight coming over too, on an almost fully packed 777. They’re leading from behind.

Thailand had reduced the mandatory quarantine period for arrivals to 7 or 10 days, depending on location….but has now increased it back to 14 days, for everyone/all locations, effective May 1st

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The CDC Has a New “Do Not Travel” Advisory System

Under the new system, countries will be placed on the agency’s level 4 “do not travel” list only if there are extreme pandemic-related health concerns..

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On April 20, no countries were designated a Level 4 on the new list.

Courtesy of CDC

Just last week, there were 89 countries on the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) Level 4 “Do Not Travel” advisory list . Today, there are none. So, what changed from one week to the next? Did 89 countries suddenly become less of a risk for travelers? Not necessarily.

As of April 18, the CDC has changed how it classifies international destinations under its COVID travel advisory system.

“To help the public understand when the highest level of concern is most urgent, this new system will reserve Level 4 travel health notices for special circumstances, such as rapidly escalating case trajectory or extremely high case counts, emergence of a new variant of concern, or healthcare infrastructure collapse,” the CDC said in a statement about the new classifications.

Whereas now Level 4 is deemed “Special Circumstances/Do Not Travel,” previously Level 4 simply indicated a “very high level of COVID-19,” and came with the advice to avoid travel to the destination. This encompassed countries that surpassed certain thresholds for new counts of cases and upward case trajectories.

This new advisory system makes it easier for travelers to assess the most critical pandemic-related concerns around the world. When a multitude of countries is deemed “high risk,” that can either deter travelers from international travel completely or can turn them off from an advisory system that paints the world in broad brushstrokes of risk.

“With this new configuration, travelers will have a more actionable alert for when they should not travel to a certain destination (Level 4), regardless of vaccination status, until we have a clearer understanding of the COVID-19 situation at that destination,” the CDC stated.

Each week, the CDC releases its updated travel health notices and corresponding map, and in recent weeks the number of countries deemed Level 4 or “do not travel” had included the vast majority of countries in the world—in early February 140 countries were on the Level 4 or “do not travel” list. This week, under the new classification system, there are no countries with a Level 4 designation, and there are 122 countries and territories that fall under the Level 3 or “COVID-19: High” list.

Levels 1, 2, and 3, represent incidents of COVID-19 that are “low,” “medium,” and “high,” respectively. There are also several countries marked as “level unkown,” which are designated in gray on the map. Knowing these designations can help travelers make informed decisions about where they feel comfortable traveling and any additional precautions they may want to take before, during, or after their travels. For all levels, the CDC recommends that travelers are up to date on their COVID-19 vaccines, but does not recommend avoiding travel there, which means there is currently nowhere in the world the CDC deems unsafe to travel to in the context of the pandemic.

This advisory system is separate from individual country requirements for travelers that are issued by each government, which have had a tendency to fluctuate often throughout the pandemic as COVID cases have risen and fallen.

The U.S. State Department uses a similar four-level travel advisory system, but the State Department’s travel advisories take into account many additional safety factors beyond public health issues, including threat of war, violence, and other humanitarian and natural crises.

>> Next: Is Europe Travel Safe During Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine?

'Do not travel' list: The US State Department is raising the alert level for most countries due to COVID-19

Travelers researching international trips during the coronavirus pandemic have been confronted with conflicting government advice.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has one system of rating the risks by country, the U.S. State Department another , producing different travel alert levels for the same country in many cases. Mexico, a popular vacation spot with American vacationers this year , is considered a Level 4 by the CDC  – meaning avoid all travel – but a L evel 3 by the State Department  – meaning "reconsider travel.'' The Bahamas was just raised to a Level 4 by the CDC and is a level 3  on the State Department scale .

The State Department is about to clear up some of that confusion, and the news is not good for travelers pondering a trip abroad.

The State Department on Monday said it was raising the alert level for a significant number of countries this week as it factors the CDC's COVID-19 data more heavily into its rating system.

"As travelers face ongoing risks due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Department of State will begin updating its travel advisories this week to better reflect the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s science-based Travel Health Notices that outline current issues affecting travelers’ health,'' the department said in a statement. "Our advisories also take into account logistical factors, including in-country testing availability and current travel restrictions for U.S. citizens.''

Learn more: Best travel insurance

The agency said about 80% of countries will now carry the "Do not travel'' label, a Level 4.

Today, just 34 of 209 countries, or about 16% are rated a Level 4. Nearly 150 countries, or about 70%, fall into Level 3. 

The State Department said the pandemic continues to pose "unprecedented risks'' to travelers: "In light of those risks, the Department of State strongly recommends U.S. citizens reconsider all travel abroad.''

The increased alert level comes as the number of  vaccinated Americans is increasing and COVID-19 restrictions are being lifted in many states and in some countries. Iceland, Croatia, Greece and Israel are among the countries welcoming or about to welcome vaccinated Americans.

Have vaccine, will travel : United adds flights to Europe 

In early April, the CDC said fully vaccinated Americans can resume domestic and international travel at low risk to themselves. But it noted that international travel poses additional risks given the spread of new COVID-19 variants.

Despite the new guidance for vaccinated travelers, the CDC says, people should stay home.

"CDC is not recommending travel at this time due to the number of rising cases,'' director Rochelle Walensky said at a White House briefing in early April.

Millions of Americans are ignoring the advice, with travel rising steadily this spring, according to Transportation Security Administration screening numbers and optimism about bookings from airline executives.