Hundreds of British tourists forced into quarantine in the Swiss ski resort of Verbier fled in the night rather than seeing their holidays go downhill, the local municipality has said.
Around 200 of the 420 or so affected British tourists in the luxury Alpine ski station quit under the cover of darkness, the Sonntags Zeitung newspaper reported.
Switzerland's ski resorts were set to boom with snow-seeking British tourists - but a flight ban due to the new Covid-19 variant raging in England put those plans on ice.
The drastic ruling by the Swiss government also included a 10-day retroactive quarantine for anyone who arrived from Britain since 14 December, following the discovery of a new variant of the coronavirus which experts fear spreads