"With the vaccination certificate we aim to help Member States to return" to safe and coordinated mobility.
Thus the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, at a press conference for the presentation of a new package of measures to lift travel restrictions.
European citizens will be able to return to travel this summer providing proof that they have undergone vaccination, or that they have tested negative or that they have been cured of Covid-19 and have developed antibodies.
These are the key contents of the new Covid pass.
The certificate, which is expected to be available from June in digital or paper format, will be interoperable and legally binding for Member States and will admit all vaccines available on the market, explained the European Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders.
"The epidemiological situation is worsening. The EU is trying to collaborate with exports but the roads run in both directions, there must be
reciprocity and proportionality
. If the situation does not change, we will have to reflect to
make exports depend on the level of opening of the receiving countries
.
And "we will reflect on whether there is proportionality with the countries that have higher rates of vaccinations," said von der Leyen.
"
The EU is the region that has exported the most
, 41 million doses to 33 countries, but we want to see reciprocity. Nothing is coming back to the EU," he added.
"From the EU we have exported ten million doses" to
Great Britain, "it is the first country to export from the EU
", not to mention that the UK produces the AstraZeneca vaccine.
"We are still waiting for doses to arrive from the UK so that there is reciprocity," explained the Commission president.
"There is reciprocity with the United States
: there are no exports of vaccines from the EU to the US and vice versa, but there is an intense flow of precursors, ingredients, and all the materials needed to make vaccines".
"AstraZeneca has announced that unfortunately in the second quarter it will deliver 70 million doses to the European Union compared to the 180 million
it had contractually promised to supply," said the president of the EU Commission.
Despite AstraZeneca's non-compliance with vaccine dose delivery commitments, "with the arrival of the
first doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine
from April we can reach the goal of having
70% of adults vaccinated by the end of summer,
" he added von der Leyen, underlining that, unlike the Anglo-Swedish company, BionTech-Pfizer and Moderna have respected their commitments.
Von der Leyen explained that 200 million doses will arrive from Pfizer-BioNTech in the second quarter, 55 from Johnson & Johnson and 35 from Moderna.
The first J&J vaccinations are expected in April.
"I trust the AstraZeneca product and I trust the EMA scientists
. We need to give them the time they need to assess the frequency of thromboembolic events" versus the vaccinated citizenry.
"We must respect procedures and respect the fact that scientists need" a few days to conduct their analyzes.
I'm glad they didn't take shortcuts "in approving vaccines," but they took the long way to go, "von der Leyen said.
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The new EU Covid pass "is not a vaccination passport, but a green certificate to avoid divisions and blocks" between EU countries, "facilitating the movement of European citizens" and restarting tourism in view of the summer, says the EU commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders, in an interview with a group of international media, including ANSA.
"The pass is interoperable and binding for EU countries", underlines Reynders, specifying that, "to avoid any form of discrimination" it offers "three alternatives" to return to travel: "demonstrate vaccination, negativity to a test or Covid healing ".
