Yesterday, the Commission proposed that Member States alleviate the current restrictions on non-essential travel into the EU. This was proposed because of how vaccination campaigns have been progressing and how the pandemic has been developing.

The Commission, therefore, plans to authorize the entry to the EU, for non-essential reasons, of people coming from countries with a good epidemiological situation and people who have received the last recommended dose of an EU-authorised vaccine. This could be expanded to include vaccines that have completed the WHO emergency use listing process. It was also proposed to raise the limit of the number of new COVID-19 cases used to define the list of countries from which travel should be allowed, changing from a rate of 25 to 100. This still remains considerably below the current EU average, which is over 420.

Vaccinated travellers

If Member States choose to drop the requirements to present a negative PCR test or to stay in quarantine for vaccinated people in the EU, they should do the same for vaccinated people from outside the EU. This will be facilitated when the Digital Green Certificate becomes functional. Those travelling should be able to prove their vaccination status with a Digital Green Certificate issued by Member States' authorities, or something equivalent. Until then, Member States should be able to accept certificates from non-EU countries based on national law, considering the capacity to confirm the authenticity, validity and integrity of the certificate.

‘Emergency brake' mechanism

The Commission also proposed a new ‘emergency brake' mechanism, to be coordinated at EU level and which would limit the risk of such variants entering the EU. This will allow Member States to act quickly and temporarily limit all travel from affected countries for a certain period of time, in order to establish suitable sanitary measures. In this case, the exceptions would be healthcare professionals, transport personnel, diplomats, transit passengers, those travelling for imperative family reasons, seafarers, and persons in need of international protection or for other humanitarian reasons. These people would still be subject to testing and quarantine arrangements.

Image © European Commission, 2020