EU Leaders Demand "Standardised" Vaccine Passport For Travel The letter calls for a “standardised certificate, which will prove that a person has been successfully vaccinated.” While it stops short at advocating mandatory vaccination, the letter further urges that “It is urgent to adopt a common understanding on how a vaccination certificate should be structured so as to be accepted in all member states.” Mitsotakis has pledged to raise the issue during an upcoming EU summit on January 21, declaring that “there is an urgent need for a high-level EU-wide mobilization to move things forward.” Vaccine passports have previously been touted by the EU, with officials suggesting back in April that visa applicants would also be required to be vaccinated. EU countries including Spain, Estonia, Iceland, and Belgium have all indicated that they are open to some form of vaccine passports, as well as sharing the data across borders. This week, it was also revealed that Denmark is the latest country to announce that it is rolling out a ‘Covid passport’, to allow those who have taken the vaccine to engage in society without any restrictions. However, the EU’s data protection chief Wojciech Wiewiórowski recently labeled the idea of an immunity passport “extreme” and has repeatedly said it is alarming, and ‘disgusting’. The spectre of so called ‘immunity passports’ is looming globally. Having left the EU, Britain would not be part of any standardised European scheme, however it has now confirmed that it is rolling out vaccine passports, despite previous denials that it would do so. Recently, the government in Ontario, Canada admitted that it is exploring ‘immunity passports’ in conjunction with restrictions on travel and access to social venues for the unvaccinated. Last month, Israel announced that citizens who get the COVID-19 vaccine will be given ‘green passports’ that will enable them to attend venues and eat at restaurants. A litany of other government and travel industry figures in both the US, Britain and beyond have suggested that ‘COVID passports’ are coming in order for ‘life to get back to normal’. https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/eu-leaders-demand-standardised-vaccine-passport-travel
It will be interesting to see how the results go... Swiss to vote in referendum on government’s Covid restrictions https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/politi...m-on-government-s-covid-restrictions/46286662 Swiss campaigners have triggered a referendum to strip the government of new legal powers to impose lockdowns and curtail public life as the country battles the pandemic. Campaign group Friends of the Constitution on Wednesday handed in a petition of 86,000 signatures collected over the past three months — well in excess of the 50,000 required — to formally initiate a nationwide vote to repeal the 2020 Covid-19 Act under Switzerland’s highly devolved democratic system. The outcome will be legally binding, with a vote scheduled for as early as June. While the pandemic has exposed social and political fractures across Europe over the rights of citizens, in Switzerland — where individuals’ rights are often treated as culturally sacrosanct and government powers are sharply proscribed by law — the strains have become particularly evident. “In our opinion, the [government] is taking advantage of the pandemic to introduce more control and less democracy,” Christoph Pfluger, a board member of Friends of the Constitution, told the Financial Times. He added: “The long-term problems that will arise from this kind of approach will be grave. We are a movement that says crisis management cannot be done without the will of the sovereign — the people. You cannot govern without the people.” Mr Pfluger said Switzerland would be the first and perhaps the only country to give its citizens a direct vote on coronavirus restrictions. Until late December, Bern’s governing Federal Council had been reluctant to impose restrictions during the second wave of the pandemic. Staunch opposition from many Swiss to further curbs and dire warnings from several of the country’s most powerful and influential lobbying groups about the economic consequences of another shutdown forestalled action in the run-up to Christmas, even as case numbers rocketed. A poll conducted by Switzerland’s Sotomo Research Institute for state broadcaster SRF in November found that 55 per cent of Swiss were concerned about their individual freedoms being restricted by government measures. The same survey found that even an 11pm curfew for bars and restaurants was considered too restrictive by a third of Swiss respondents. Mr Pfluger said his campaign had been “astonished” by the level of support from volunteers it had gained in recent weeks and the speed with which it had been able to gather signatures. The Swiss government’s laissez-faire approach exploded into a diplomatic stand-off in early December as the country refused to force its ski resorts to close, to the anger of its Alpine neighbours. On December 18, however, Bern was forced to order a nationwide shutdown of restaurants, bars and leisure facilities that will remain in force until the end of February. On Wednesday the shutdown was extended to cover shops selling non-essential goods. The referendum triggered on Wednesday takes aim at the legislation that underpins such curbs. The Covid-19 Act, approved by lawmakers in September, gives Swiss authorities a continuing legal basis to impose restrictions to handle the coronavirus outbreak in the country. Before the legislation, Bern only had the power to curb public life through unilateral emergency decrees under Switzerland’s Epidemics Act. Those powers were strictly time-limited and subject to onerous parliamentary oversight. Critics of the campaign to repeal the new laws note that by the time the referendum is held, not only will the pandemic likely be in remission, but many of the legal provisions granted under the Covid-19 Act will automatically have lapsed according to sunset clauses written into the legislation. The Friends of the Constitution say they are battling to ensure a precedent is not set for future emergencies. “On a purely objective level, the [Covid-19] law is not that important,” said Mr Pfluger. “But it is one part of a bigger puzzle.” According to the Swiss Federal Office of Public Health, the country recorded 3,001 new infections on Tuesday, a rate of 477 per 100,000 citizens. Numbers have been slowly but steadily falling since the new year, and are sharply down from a peak of 10,558 daily new cases recorded on November 2.