UK plans certification system for those who want to travel to countries that may demand it as a condition for entry. *title edited by MNHQ at OP's request*

[Frequentflier]

In the Times. www.thetimes.co.uk/article/government-plans-covid-vaccine-passports-to-allow-foreign-holidays-3mc9vd0xk

So what about if you don’t have the vaccine? For one reason or another? You can never go on holiday?

Aren’t or weren’t they not giving the vaccine to those with severe allergies- my dad can’t have the vaccine due to allergies. Can he never go on holiday again?

It’s not about holidays for me

On a serious note, same. I want to see family & I don't want to wait.

@userxx

So what happens if you've booked a holiday and you're not due to have the vaccine until later in the year?

If people haven't learned by now and are still going ahead booking holidays, well then 🤷🏽‍♀️

@Waxonwaxoff0

Bit annoying for those of us last in line for the vaccine. I doubt I'll have had mine by the summer.

Yes quite. Is going to be a shade galling watching others travel and bring back more variants before we are vaccinated.

So what about if you don’t have the vaccine? For one reason or another? You can never go on holiday?

Presumably those who can’t be vaxxed for medical reasons will be exempt.

If you choose not too, you take the consequences, which might mean no holidays, yes.

I already have a yellow fever ‘passport’, so would have no issue with this. Just currently not in the queue as under 50.

Already decided not going abroad this year. But hoping to go to South Africa next summer.

Or maybe my whole family can start self-identifying as foetuses or bats even. All immune, even better

Well for a start, it's not up to us if other countries decide to accept our vaccine passport or not. Two, I wonder what countries that did take part in a scheme like this plan to do about children?

I wonder whether it will state the vaccine you’ve had. For example, france has said the AZ vaccine isn’t good enough if you’re over 65, they may choose to count those people in the same group as unvaccinated.

@zafferana

I'm guessing they will need a negative test to travel with vaccinated parents

So if this is acceptable for children, why can't adults produce a negative test as well in order to be allowed entry?

@24butfeeling80

So what about if you don’t have the vaccine? For one reason or another? You can never go on holiday?

Aren’t or weren’t they not giving the vaccine to those with severe allergies- my dad can’t have the vaccine due to allergies. Can he never go on holiday again?

At the moment it’s just Greece who wants this. We’re not talking no vaccine no holidays anywhere.

why can't adults produce a negative test as well in order to be allowed entry?

Because the vaccine is added protection and it’s not up to you to tell Greece how to manage people entering their country.

I presume the same requirements will be put in place for children when the vaccine is approved and widely available for them.

@southeastdweller

We’re not talking no vaccine no holidays anywhere

Yes, but some posters are avid for this to happen and keep going on about it. It's ridiculous

I am sure for some countries evidence of being vaccinated will be required so seems sensible to have some document as evidence.

For example, france has said the AZ vaccine isn’t good enough if you’re over 65, they may choose to count those people in the same group as unvaccinated.

I think discriminating between approved vaccines would be a political step too far.

Oxford AZ is, this far, the only one to have published data on limiting transmission, and its positive, and it’s transmission. Greece cares about I imagine.

[quote trulydelicious]@southeastdweller

We’re not talking no vaccine no holidays anywhere

Yes, but some posters are avid for this to happen and keep going on about it. It's ridiculous[/quote]
I know they are, the mouth frothing is quite laughable.

@5lilducks

I am a bit confused - i thought the vaccine is only supposed to stop the recipient from getting unwell but won't stop the recipient from getting the virus and passing it on? So someone can have a VP and catch one of the many variants the uk seemed to be plagued atm and carry it with them to another country along with their passports? Or has that advice changed now and have they said vaccines guard against catching and spreading as well? I appreciate herd immunity will stop the spread but I wouldnt have thought we would be able to get herd immunity by summer? Genuinely confused.

It was always expected that the vaccines would reduce the risk of infection and transmission as well as getting sick, but because the tests weren’t set up to test for that they couldn’t state it as a fact.

Now the evidence is piling up from further trials and the Israeli programme, that they do indeed reduce infection and transmission risk considerably.

I think some of the British exceptionalists on here may not realise that travellers from Britain are currently banned in 30 countries worldwide. ( could be slightly more or less; stopped counting). You can bet I am avid for it.

[quote zafferana]Actually, if the vaccine programme keeps up its current pace all UK adults should be vaccinated by 25 June @Waxonwaxoff0. I bloody hope so. Wouldn't it be amazing to be able to go abroad this summer? There's a good graph on this page of the NYT, if you can see it?

www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/02/04/world/europe/covid-vaccine-uk-rate.html[/quote]
But that’s only the first dose! We’d still all need our second doses to be fully vaccinated. The Pfizer and AZ drugs are both licenced for 2 doses and their trial data was for 2 doses. If it’s going to take 6 months to give all adults 1 dose, with a 12 week gap in between doses, then guessing it will take another 6 months to give the second dose? So we won’t be out of this til December

watching others travel and bring back more variants before we are vaccinated.

I agree that's a worry and I hope the govt keeps travel to essential only until ALL adults have been vaccinated for this precise reason. The last thing we need is all the over 50s zooming off on holiday and bringing back a really virulent strain that's going to let rip through the rest of the population before they can get vaccinated.

Countries get to choose who they let in in order to protect their own population. And the UK gets to choose whether quarantine is required when you return.

Preventing a vaccinated seventy year old, (who may well have had an utterly shit year themselves) from going on holiday is not going to make life any better for an unvaccinated twenty something - you can’t just insist that someone else’s government needs to let you in even if it presents a genuine risk to their population “because otherwise it’s not fair”. Or do people genuinely not want to see anyone else doing something nice?

@TheKeatingFive

I think discriminating between approved vaccines would be a political step too far

If they have no problem discriminating people based on age or medical status, they will most likely discriminate between vaccines.

Or worse, what you are suggesting is that they don't trust the Oxford-AZ vaccine but they should accept it as a 'tick box' exercise, which makes the whole control redundant.

So what's the point of all this? I'm confused now

Our mortgage is paid by people flying and going on holiday.

So this is great news. And not just for us, but for the economies elsewhere in Europe which have been decimated by lack of visitors.

So 10 Mil people have had their first dose and 498,000 have had their second dose. So only 498,000 have been fully vaccinated. Are vaccine passports going to be given to those who’ve only had one dose? Will other countries accept this as proof of vaccination?

If they have no problem discriminating people based on age or medical status, they will most likely discriminate between vaccines.

Of course you’re allowed to discriminate on somethings and not others.

These vaccines have all been approved by official bodies. In fact they have been approved for use by all by official bodies.

Individual countries have taken specific decisions, off the back of that. Some of these decisions are recommendations, not binding (ROI), they’ve also indicated they are temporary. To start faffing around over vaccine types would be utterly ridiculous.