EU Member States should take a unified approach to accept vaccines such as Sinovac in COVID-19 certificates, but this is not something the European Commission can enforce. Vice-President Margaritis Schinas said in response to a question by Exit News at a meeting of media partner EURACTIV in Brussels.
To travel to most places in Europe and to enter cafes, restaurants, hotels, bars and various indoor activities, and to travel with most airlines, a COVID-19 pass is required. This pass carries a QR code and evidence of the date of the first two doses of vaccination and a booster. The issue is, there is no EU-wide consensus on which vaccines are accepted, whether boosters are included, or what rules of entry to a country are.
This has caused travel disruption for millions of citizens who have been vaccinated with vaccines such as Sinovac, Sinopharm and Sputnik.
In Albania, the vaccination process started in January 2021 and the majority of vaccines at this time were Sinovac and Sputnik. Now, vaccination, including booster shots, are predominantly done with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.
But those who had two doses of Sinovac, even with an AstraZeneca or Pfizer booster, will run into difficulties in some European countries. The Albanian government is not currently offering a full vaccination course with EMA approved vaccines leaving some out in the cold.
When asked if a harmonisation of entry requirements and the vaccines recognised is something that could be enforced by the EC, Schinas was clear that it was not.
“The European Commission, when discussing and adopting the certificate, we clearly said that the recognition of certificates issued by third countries is left to the member states. But our suggestion was to be broad enough to include not only the vaccines that were approved by the EMA but also the vaccines that were approved by the WHO,” he said.
“I think the right thing to do is enlarge this as much as we can, but this was a recommendation, and some member states do it like this, others don’t.”
When pressed on whether further harmonisation could be pushed for by the Commission, Schinas said, “It is not happening because it is a recommendation that member states are free to take or not. For us, we have constructed the proposal and the possibility to be as open as possible.”
Meanwhile, the EU is set to include boosters on the certificate, making it even harder for those who have two doses of a non-EMA approved vaccine.
