BRUSSELS – Under pressure from member states desperate to save the summer tourist season, the European Union on Wednesday proposed a Covid-19 certificate enabling people to travel more freely.
The proposed document, known as a Digital Green Certificate, will enable European residents and their families to travel across the block at will, as long as they have evidence of Covid-19 vaccination, a negative result or a documented recovery. of the virus. .
The certificates are free and available in digital or paper format.
“The digital green certificate will not be a condition of free movement, and it will not discriminate in any way,” said Didier Reynders, the top official of the Bloc for Justice, adding that the aim was to ” gradually restore free movement within the EU and avoid fragmentation. “
Freedom of movement is the cornerstone of the bloc, but travel restrictions are traditionally under the supervision of national governments. The commission’s plan is another attempt to coordinate a chaotic patchwork of divergent national measures, significantly hampering travel within the previously borderless area.
Under the proposed rules, national governments can decide which travel restrictions, such as mandatory quarantine, will be lifted for certificate holders.
The proposal, which must be approved by the European Parliament and the majority of member states, comes because many European countries are experiencing a third wave of infections, as well as a slow mass vaccination effort, damaged by doubts about a shot made by AstraZeneca . Several countries have suddenly suspended the use of the vaccine, at least temporarily, which has confused citizens and possibly increased resistance to vaccinations.
So far, only 9.8 percent of European Union residents have been vaccinated, leaving the bloc far behind Britain and the United States.
On Wednesday, top EU officials acknowledged the slow start of the bloc’s vaccination campaign and once again singled out criticism of “other vaccine-producing countries” that are accumulating according to their doses.
“We want to see reciprocity and proportionality in exports, and we are ready to use the tools we need to work on them,” said Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European Commission. “It’s about ensuring that Europe gets its fair share.”
Her remarks were the latest salvo in a long-running dispute between Brussels and London over vaccines.
The commission’s goal of vaccinating 70 per cent of the adult population by the end of the summer seems to be disappearing, especially as the largest European countries have suspended the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine due to reports of some cases of severe blood clots among people who received it. . The suspension could be lifted soon, but serious production problems have made millions of doses of AstraZeneca available.
The problems were an embarrassment to the European Union and its executive, the Commission, which took control of the procurement process, although member states are responsible for issuing vaccinations.
But Europeans, held under one of the longest and most severe barriers in the world, are experiencing a deep pandemic, which further complicates the way out of the crisis.
The commission also set out a long-term strategy to gradually lift the closure measures, subject to the epidemiological situation of each country. The commission will rule on the basis of simulations by the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control.
“The situation with the virus in Europe is still very challenging,” said Stella Kyriakides, the bloc’s biggest health official. “It is only through a joint approach that we can safely return to full free movement in the EU”
The proposal does not change Europe’s current rules on external travel. The bloc restricted non-significant travel from countries outside the bloc, with a small number of exceptions, based on infection rates. Non-EU travelers can receive a Covid-19 certificate, but only if their visit to Europe falls under one of the exceptions.
In the meantime, some member states are on strike on their own and are keen to reopen to non-European tourists. Greece has already signed an agreement with Israel and is working on similar deals with ten other countries, including Britain, Canada and the United States.
The Commission’s plan must be approved by the European Parliament and a majority of Member States. The aim is to put the certificates into effect by mid-June to save the summer season.
The initial push for some form of vaccination certificate comes from countries heavily dependent on tourism, led by Greece, while others, including France and Germany, have been wary of the possibility of discrimination between Europeans who are vaccinated and not vaccinated. is not. as privacy issues.
National governments are also divided over which vaccines should be included in the pass. Hungary vaccinates its citizens with the Russian Sputnik vaccination and the shot made by Sinopharm, a Chinese state-owned enterprise, although none of the European Medicines Agencies have been approved, and other countries want to do the same.
In a spirit of compromise, the commission proposed that all shots approved by the EU regulator should be included in the pass, but gave member states discretionary powers to recognize vaccines not yet allowed in Europe.
Many countries have reintroduced border controls in recent months and are beginning to require quarantine for oncoming travelers, as more contagious virus variants have begun to spread rapidly, a bleak version of the first wave of the pandemic. Some countries, such as Belgium, which shares borders with four other EU countries, have banned non-essential travel.
Juan Fernando López Aguilar, a European socialist legislator from Spain, is likely to focus on data protection and privacy rights on any discussions of the Covid-19 certificate. “We need to make sure that every step we take is compatible with the fundamental rights of the citizen,” he said.
Guntram Wolff, the director of Bruegel, a research group focused on economic policy in Europe, said the vaccination and testing was ‘absolutely essential’ for the reopening of the tourism sector.
“Once a person is vaccinated and the evidence shows that he or she can no longer transmit the virus, how can you justify the restriction of his or her basic freedoms?” he asked.
“The EU has been slow as countries do not agree on what travel should be allowed,” he said. “They do not even agree on which vaccines are safe.”