Ryanair will be cutting flights from the end of January in response to the latest lockdown measures.

The budget airline said that “few, if any, flights being operated to/from Ireland or the UK from the end of Jan”.

Ryanair said in a statement: “The WHO have previously confirmed that governments should do everything possible to avoid brutal lockdowns, because lockdowns ‘do not get rid of the virus’.”

“Ireland’s Covid-19 travel restrictions are already the most stringent in Europe, and so these new flight restrictions are inexplicable and ineffective when Ireland continues to operate an open border between the Republic and the North of Ireland.”

“Ryanair does not expect these flight cuts and further traffic reductions will materially affect its net loss for the year to 31 March 2021 since many of these flights would have been loss making.”

“The fact that the Danish Government, with a similar five million population, has already vaccinated 10 times more citizens than Ireland shows that emergency action is needed to speed Covid vaccinations in Ireland.”

“All customers affected by these further flight cancellations and further travel restrictions will receive emails advising them of their entitlements of free moves and/or refunds later today.”

Ryanair has cut its full year traffic forecast from 35m to below 26-30m passengers.

Other airlines including Easyjet and British Airways are also reviewing flights over the lockdown period.

Shares in the group fell 2% on Thursday.