Asked why all international travellers should be forced to self-isolate on arrival in the UK even if their departure countries have fewer omicron cases than Scotland, Ms Sturgeon said: “The problem is we don’t yet know where this variant is so we can’t say for certain.

“There are countries literally every hour right now detecting cases of it. This time yesterday we didn’t know we had it in Scotland. Now we do. So the reason at an early stage of a new virus or a new variant of the virus for being quite broad based in your protective approaches, rather than targeted as you might be able to become later, is that none of us know where this variant is.

“We can’t say for certain that country X doesn’t have it. And that’s why you need broader base protections at this stage and you do see right now many different countries arriving at those judgments.

“Hopefully, that won’t be required for long as our understanding and knowledge of this develops. But that kind of approach right now I think is an important protection as we try to contain community transmission here… we’re not compounding that challenge for ourselves by having more of the variant coming into the country.”