On Tuesday 19 January, the European Commission published a new communication as input for the meeting of European Heads of State or Government on Covid-19. Entitled ‘A united front to beat Covid-19’, this document proposes quantitative vaccination and genome sequencing objectives to rapidly identify new mutations in the virus.
“Vaccination is not a race between countries, but against the clock”, said commission vice-president Margarítis Schinás.
New quantitative targets
The new communication suggests that Member States should vaccinate at least 80% of people over 80 years of age and 80% of health and social service professionals by March 2021 and at least 70% of the adult population by summer 2021. “This is ambitious, but achievable”, Schinás said, counting on new doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines and new authorisations in the near future.
The text also recommends that genome sequencing be urgently increased to at least 5% and ideally to 10% of positive test results, bearing in mind that this proportion is currently closer to 1%.
At a press conference, Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides also called on Member States to “update their testing strategies in the coming weeks to reflect new variants and to incorporate the use of antigenic tests”.
Fuelling discussion among EU leaders, including on certificates
This communication lays the groundwork for the discussion to be held by European leaders by videoconference on 21 January. It identifies four urgent areas for discussion: vaccination, new mutations, mobility, and international solidarity. These themes are also acknowledged in the letter of invitation to the EU-27 written by Charles Michel.
The President of the European Council also emphasised that “the vaccination process opens the debate on certification”. He added: “We will discuss whether a common approach to certification is appropriate and, if so, under what circumstances certificates could be used”.
In the press room on Tuesday, Margarítis Schinás and Stella Kyriakides both defended the added value, from a public health point of view, of such a certificate, but refused to talk about an immunity passport. Such certificates, Mrs Kyriakides said, provide for follow-up in case of side effects and allow a clear record of each individual’s vaccination history. “This is what we are discussing at this stage. It is premature to consider it for purposes other than health protection. However, we can look ahead and see the cross-border application of such a certificate”, she explained. This application, the Vice-President continued, could particularly facilitate travel and precede the lifting of restrictions. “However, this will presuppose a number of vaccinations and a common policy framework for such use”.
‘No’ to the closure of internal borders
With regard to intra-EU travel restrictions, the Commission continues to “strongly discourage” non-essential travel until the situation improves. However, it rejects internal border control measures, which have not proved their usefulness, as well as abrupt suspensions of links, particularly air or sea links, and other general travel bans, which it considers ineffective and likely to create chaos. These measures “have no added value in the situation we find ourselves in, especially with the variants”, commented Mr Schinás.
Instead, the Commission continues to advocate for green corridors facilitating the movement of essential functions and reiterates its support for restrictive measures such as testing on arrival on Member States’ territory or quarantine for people returning from high-risk areas. These “proportionate measures” should be maintained, she advocates.
The Commission stresses, however, that it will examine whether the evolution of the variants justifies a review of this set of travel restrictions. The subject will also be addressed on Thursday by the EU-27.
Link to the communication: https://bit.ly/38VZldy (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean and Solenn Paulic)