The U.K. is ramping up its mass vaccination program as the government seeks to protect the countrys oldest and most vulnerable residents before easing a third national lockdown. Under the travel corridor arrangements, anyone arriving in the U.K. from countries deemed safe was exempt from a period of quarantine. Though the decision was widely welcomed, including by lobby group Airlines U.K., Johnson was also accused again of tardy decision-making. Scientists have said there is no indication the U.K. variant reacts any differently to coronavirus vaccines. The U.K. is ramping up its mass vaccination program to the country’s oldest and most vulnerable residents.

“President Trump is already a thing of the past," Prime Minister Antonio Costa of Portugal, which holds the EU's rotating presidency, said Thursday. “I don’t dabble much in provocation, but for me this page is turned,” EU Council President Charles Michel said. “Above all, I am looking forward to the new American President," said EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen. Italian Premier Giuseppe Conte said Italy “can’t wait to work together with President Biden." President Trump often criticized European allies for cowering under the U.S. defense and security umbrella while seeking economic advantage through subsidies and other trade tactics.

Biden has made clear that he wants to “repair” the trans-Atlantic relationship, “and that is urgently necessary,” Maas said at a panel event in Berlin. Recent years, he said, were an exercise in “damage control” on international diplomacy and issues such as climate change. Portuguese Foreign Minister Augusto Santos Silva called for new talks with the U.S. on trade relations. And he noted that a major objection to the Trump administration's approach was its language. “We were permanently treated by our American friends, and the Trump administration, not as friends and allies but as adversaries or even enemies,” he said.