On 17 March, the European Union will offer details about its proposed vaccine passport, the EU version of the Israeli “Green Pass.” (See our 23 February article, “ISRAEL: NO VACCINE, NO GREEN PASSPORT.”)
But, proof of being vaccinated will not be enough to qualify for the passport. The vaccine has to be one of the current four officially approved by the EU: Pfizer-BioNtech, AstraZeneca, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson. (Note: the Johnson & Johnson single-shot vaccine was just approved by the European Medicines Agency last Thursday.)
According to a 12 March report in Euronews, EU justice commissioner Didier Reynders made it clear that while member states were free to get their citizens vaccinated by other products, they would not be allocated a licensed travel certificate.
It was also reported that according to the proposal, even those who comply and get a vaccination passport will not be given full freedom to move around. An EU source confirmed that “tests and quarantine will continue to be the enablers of free movement. Thus, vaccination does not become a pre-condition for free movement.”
Euronews wrote,
“[Reynders] indicated Thursday that data protection and possible discrimination remained key concerns for the European Commission working on a proposal for a COVID-19 travel certificate. But Friday’s leak shows that there is a focus on vaccination selection… Reynders is aiming to fast-track the proposal at the European Parliament, leading to a ‘binding instrument’ for all member states before the summer.”
There is no unified consensus among EU members. While Spain, Portugal, and Greece, three nations highly-dependent on tourism, strongly favor the “Green Pass,” Germany and other northern countries have expressed less enthusiastic support.
On 2 March, the news outlet DW published the article titled,
EU Vaccine Passport: An Ethical and Legal Minefield?
The sub-headline reads:
“Looking at the European Commission’s track record in tackling the pandemic, you might be forgiven for thinking that it may have bitten off more than it can chew with its latest proposal for a vaccination document.”
The article quotes Melinda Mills, director of the Leverhulme Center for Demographic Science at the University of Oxford:
“A central ethical concern is to first determine who you would exclude if certificates were introduced. There are certain people who are unable to have vaccines for medical reasons such as those with allergies or pregnant women. In some countries, certain ethnic minorities are more vaccine hesitant, which would mean that this group could be inadvertently excluded.”
Revealing the uncertainty around the overall effectiveness of the approved vaccines, all rushed into circulation bypassing the standard length of time for studying both their efficacy and safety, is this statement from Oxford professor of epidemiology Chris Dye:
“At the most basic level, we are still gathering data on exactly how effective each vaccine is in preventing infection and transmission and on how long the immunity will last.”
TREND FORECAST: The Wall Street Journal reported last Thursday that despite all the hype around getting vaccinated, to date, only 8 percent of people in Germany, Italy, and France have received their first shot. The Journal said, “Much of Europe has been in lockdown for months, hitting the region’s troubled economy and drawing protests in some countries. On Wednesday, [German] Chancellor Angela Merkel warned her country faces three tough months ahead.”
Thus, we forecast there will be strong anti-Green Passport movements in the coming months. Long term, however, many nations will follow the Chinese rule of complete government dominance: The “authorities” will know who has been vaccinated and will ban all those from entering their nation who have not been injected.