COVID leaves woman stranded in Tonga for a year and a half and counting

A woman who flew to Tonga for a weekend is still stuck there after 18 months.

Zoe Stephens travelled to the south pacific island in March 2020 but was left stranded when the coronavirus crisis gripped the world as Tonga went into lockdown and has been closed off to foreign nationals ever since.

Stephens has managed to stay Covid-free whilst trapped in Tonga and has been house-sitting for a family who is also stranded somewhere and unable to return due to the restrictions.

She told CNN Travel: "There's not many people that can relate to being stuck on an island without your friends or your family, in a country that you didn't deliberately end up in.

"Or being locked out of the country that you live in, and then not being able to get back. And being scared to go back to your home country because of a weird virus that's going around. So it's pretty isolating." 

This is a production independent of The Gleaner Company (Media) Limited's newsroom. For feedback: contact the Digital Integration and Marketing Department at Newsletters@gleanerjm.com