BELGIUM: The European Union (EU) is poised to limit the validity of vaccine recognition in its EU Covid certificate to nine months, its executive said today, in a bid to encourage boosters.
The European Commission said in a statement it has adopted “a binding acceptance period of nine months (precisely 270 days) of vaccination certificates for the purposes of intra-EU travel”, to come into force from February 1.
The measure—which needs approval of EU member states to come into effect—comes as the bloc races to get booster jabs into arms under the shadow of the highly infectious Omicron variant.
Several EU countries had already announced go-it-alone measures that would soon consider double-jabbed people no longer “fully vaccinated” unless they also got a booster shot.
France, for instance, had said all adults whose second jab was more than six months old would be booted from the national Covid pass—which is part of the EU Covid certificate system—from January 15 unless they could show a third vaccination.
Seven other EU countries—Portugal, Ireland, Cyprus, Latvia, Italy, Greece and Austria—have also brought in emergency measures requiring even vaccinated EU travellers to take pre-departure Covid tests or to quarantine on arrival. – THE MALAY MAIL