Airlines Could Use EU COVID Pass this Summer

Airlines Could Use EU COVID Pass this Summer

Airlines could check new European Union COVID certificates of onboard passengers before allowing them to go on summer holidays. This was a recommendation by a senior official on Tuesday, as the government seeks to restart the bloc’s pandemic-ravaged travel sector.

EU Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders told lawmakers that the EU’s proposed COVID travel certificate would contain information on vaccination. It would also include tests or recovery information, and would be valid until the World Health Organisation (WHO) declares the pandemic over. 

Europe is right through its third wave of the coronavirus pandemic. However, southern EU countries that rely on tourism are already trying to plan out ways to help their hotels, restaurants and tourist attractions this summer. Theirs was against a more sceptical Belgium, France or Germany.

The certificate did not amount to a “vaccination passport”, Reynders stressed. This is because having been inoculated could not on its own give people the right to travel freely. That would discriminate against those who cannot or would not get the jab, he explained.

Under the proposal, the bloc’s 27 countries would have to honour EU-approved vaccinations. But they could also choose to recognize others, such as Russia’s Sputnik V, he said. He also added, however, that it was unclear how long immunity lasts.

EU lawmakers raised data privacy issues and practicalities of checking such certificates. That’s for millions of people crossing borders in their vehicles and trucks daily in what is normally the bloc’s open travel zone. Now, that is criss-crossed by often disjointed health and public safety restrictions on movement.

Britain and the EU :  First 100 Days of Brexit

The health crisis has caused the British economy to slump, trade volumes to crash, and many jobs to disappear, uncertain whether those jobs would still return. Additionally, adjustment to Brexit has barely even begun, with many temporary arrangements still in place

The COVID-19 pandemic has overwhelmed the short-term results of quitting the European Union. Forecasts of its effects on Britain’s growth, trade and employment have been rendered null. 

Negotiations on crucial new agreements have yet to be planned out and to take place. These include deals that will shape the City of London as a financial hub in the future. 

 

The full legal meaning of Brexit is as of the moment not yet clear to all. And the likeliness would be, that it will take years before Brexit’s enduring effects can be judged.