Ireland and Iceland ending Covid restrictions

Ireland Scraps COVID Restrictions, Becoming the Most Travel-Friendly Country in the E.U. | Inside Hook - Lindsay Rogers:

January 24, 2022 - "In a televised address on Friday, Prime Minister Micheal Martin announced that — per the advice of public health officials — bars and restaurants would no longer need to close at 8 p.m. or to ask customers for proof of vaccination, and all venues, both indoor and outdoor, would be able to return to full capacity, effective Saturday.... [P]eople will still be expected to wear face coverings on public transport and in shops, but only until the end of February....

"This comes on the heels of the country’s decision to drop the testing requirement for vaccinated travelers at the start of the new year, meaning it’s currently one of the easiest countries to visit. And ... with pubs being able to operate at full capacity and not adhere to a curfew, all signs point to Ireland being able to properly celebrate St. Patrick’s Day for the first time since before the pandemic, when an estimated two million people gathered to attend parades and festivals nationwide.

"The latest series of changes also align Ireland with Northern Ireland where COVID rules are involved, with the latter loosening restrictions and dropping vaccine passes on Thursday. Northern Ireland is also set to reopen nightclubs next week."
Read more: https://www.insidehook.com/daily_brief/travel/ireland-scraps-covid-restrictions

Ireland drops most of its remaining COVID restrictions | Saltwire - Graham Fahy, Reuters:

February 22, 2022 - "Ireland on Tuesday said it will drop most of its remaining pandemic-linked restrictions from Feb. 28 as an Omicron-fuelled wave of infections ebbs.... People will no longer be legally required to wear masks, physical distancing measures in schools will end, and the national testing and tracing program will be scaled back. Government advice that masks should be worn on public transport and in healthcare settings will remain."
Read more:  https://www.saltwire.com/atlantic-canada/news/ireland-drops-most-of-its-remaining-covid-restrictions-100696551/

Iceland Lifts Several National COVID-19 Rules Including Quarantine Requirement | Schwengen News:

February 12, 2022 - "According to a press release issued by Iceland’s Ministry of Health yesterday, on February 12, persons who are already in self-isolation do not need to undergo COVID-19 testing in order to end their quarantine period.... In addition, the same has revealed that citizens of Iceland who have been exposed to the virus will no longer be required to undergo testing.... While the authorities have emphasised that the entry rules will remain unchanged for incoming travellers, they have announced that less stringent national COVID-19 restrictions will now apply within the country.

"Starting from today, the number of people allowed in indoor areas during the same time will be increased to 200. Previously, there was a limit of 50 persons. On the other hand, limitations in the number of persons for outdoor areas will be removed. Similarly, stores will no longer have restrictions in place when it comes to the number of people that are allowed access.

"Crowded events with up to 1,000 persons will also now be allowed, provided that everyone is seated and wears a mask. Regarding the requirement to wear a mask while in outdoor and indoor public areas, the Ministry has explained that citizens of the country, as well as travellers, will be required to follow this requirement only if the one-meter-distance rules can not be followed."
Read more: https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/news/iceland-lifts-several-national-covid-19-rules-including-quarantine-requirement/

Iceland to lift all COVID-19 restrictions on Friday | Reuters:

February 23, 2022 - "Iceland will lift all remaining COVID-19 restrictions on Friday, including a 200-person indoor gathering limit and restricted opening hours for bars, the Ministry of Health said on Wednesday. 'Widespread societal resistance to COVID-19 is the main route out of the epidemic,' the ministry said in a statement, citing infectious disease authorities. 'To achieve this, as many people as possible need to be infected with the virus as the vaccines are not enough, even though they provide good protection against serious illness,' it added. All border restrictions would also be lifted, it said." [stress added]
Read more: https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/iceland-lift-all-covid-19-restrictions-friday-media-reports-2022-02-23/

Redefining "fully vaccinated"

 COVID boosters: Is the definition of 'fully vaccinated' about to change to 3 vaccine doses? | Euronews - Julie Gaubert: 

November 21, 2021 - "Across Europe, the COVID-19 pandemic shows no signs of abating with several countries announcing further restrictions in recent days to contain a surge in new cases. As well as a new lockdown, Austria announced this week that vaccination will be made compulsory from February 1, making it the first EU country to issue such a mandate. But ... it is now becoming apparent that a third dose, or booster, will now be needed to keep COVID-19 cases numbers down. 

"On Monday, British prime minister Boris Johnson admitted that to be fully vaccinated no longer meant having two COVID jabs but rather three doses in order to prevent pandemic restrictions from being reinforced in the UK.... In the UK, the third dose has already been authorised for the over-50s and frail people since the beginning of September, with the goal of administering '10 million booster doses before Christmas,' Johnson said.

"Many European countries have launched their booster campaigns in recent weeks, but only 3.7 per cent of the continent's population has received a third injection, according to AFP.... Iceland is leading the way. Nearly 1 in 5 people have already received a booster dose in a population that is already 90 per cent vaccinated. Faced with the resurgence of cases, the Icelandic government announced last Friday new health measures for its citizens, including the wearing of masks and the third dose for all those over 16.

"Further to the east, Hungary and Serbia are in second place with 14 and 16 out of every 100 inhabitants respectively being triple vaccinated, according to data compiled by the OurWorldinData website.

"The United States announced on Friday health authorities have given the green light for a third dose of COVID vaccine for all adults who were fully vaccinated at least six months ago.

"In France, the over-65s have been called upon since September to receive a third jab or risk having their ‘passe sanitaire’, or COVID health pass, suspended in mid-December.... Is making a third dose a condition for obtaining a health pass becoming widespread? In France, the Academy of Medicine rejected the idea. The organisation said on October 29, that it was opposed to the possibility, which it said 'goes beyond' the objective of the document. This measure 'transgresses the role of the health pass, which was to limit the risk of transmission of the virus and to encourage the population to be vaccinated', the institution said in a statement.

"In Israel, on the other hand, unless you received your second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine within the last six months, you will now need a third dose to become eligible for a green pass, which allows entry to gyms, restaurants, and other venues.

"World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said it was 'a scandal' that six times more booster shots are being administered around the world daily than primary doses in low-income countries, adding that 'it must stop now'. 'It makes no sense to give boosters to healthy adults, or to vaccinate children, when health workers, older people and other high-risk groups around the world are still waiting for their first dose,' the WHO chief warned at a media briefing on November 12.

"For Dr David Nabarro, the WHO's special envoy on COVID-19, relying only on a full vaccination strategy is a gamble for rich countries. 'It has never been done before and it would really be an inappropriate public health strategy to do so,' he told the UK parliament’s All-Party Group on vaccines. The main threat is the reliance on existing vaccines, Nabarro warned." [stress added]

Read more: https://www.euronews.com/next/2021/11/21/covid-boosters-is-the-definition-of-fully-vaccinated-about-to-change-to-mean-3-vaccine-dos

We may soon need a fourth COVID vaccine dose because of the Omicron outbreak, says Pfizer CEO | Euronews - Pascale Davies: 

December 10, 2021 - "People may need a fourth COVID-19 shot sooner than expected, Pfizer’s CEO said on Wednesday. Albert Bourla told CNBC that preliminary research shows the new Omicron variant can undermine protective antibodies generated by the vaccine developed with BioNTech. The comments come after the company released the results from an initial lab study on Wednesday that showed a three-shot course of their COVID-19 vaccine could significantly protect against the new variant and said they could deliver an upgraded vaccine in March 2022 if needed.

"'When we see real-world data, it will determine if the omicron is well covered by the third dose and for how long. And the second point, I think we will need a fourth dose,' Bourla told CNBC, adding, it was still unclear when a fourth dose would be needed....

"As countries scramble to rollout COVID-19 vaccine boosters, a World Health Organization (WHO) advisory group on Thursday decided against endorsing a broad-based rollout of booster shots. The Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) said poor countries are subject to vaccine inequality and that the first dose should be the priority. The WHO has endorsed third vaccines or booster shots for those who are immunocompromised or received an inactivated COVID-19 vaccine. But WHO experts have said there is not enough data on the Omicron variant to demonstrate that boosters are necessary."

Read more: https://www.euronews.com/next/2021/12/10/we-may-soon-need-a-fourth-covid-vaccine-dose-because-of-the-omicron-outbreak-says-pfizer-c

2 countries open borders to Covid recovered

'Immunity passports' are already here. But they come with warnings |  CNN - Scott McLean and Florence Davey-Attlee:

December 6, 2020 - "With miles of barbed wire and electric fencing along its border and open government hostility to migrants, Hungary's borders aren't always the friendliest place for foreigners.... Amid the pandemic, Hungary has shut its doors to almost everyone, even its European neighbors. Unless, they've had Covid-19....

"The policy, which came into force in early September, opens the door to visitors who can provide evidence that they've recovered from Covid-19 -- proof of both a positive and negative test in the past six months. Iceland has plans for a similar policy beginning next week -- and it already gives citizens who have previously been infected permission to ignore the nationwide mask mandate. Experts call these types of policies a kind of 'immunity passport.' 

"But does beating the virus actually give you immunity? The evidence so far suggests that for most people, it does. 'It's certainly theoretically possible that some people even who have antibodies may not be protected," Dr. Ania Wajnberg tells CNN outside her lab at Mount Sinai Hospital's Icahn School of Medicine in New York. 'But I think the majority of people that test positive for antibodies will be protected for some time.'

"Wajnberg is leading a massive study of more than 30,000 people who had mild to moderate cases of Covid-19. Her latest research published in October found that more than 90% of people have enough antibodies to kill the virus for many months after infection, perhaps longer.... 'This may be a reasonable way to begin to reopen society and allow for travel and business,' she says.

"Iceland's chief epidemiologist Thorolfur Gudnason has reached the same conclusion based on his country's own data, and studies from abroad.... The testing and quarantine exemption at the border begins December 10. The North Atlantic tourist magnet will accept documented proof of a positive polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test that is at least 14 days old, or enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) test that measures antibody levels -- provided it's issued by an approved European lab. Thorolfur says Icelanders who have beat the virus are also exempt from the nationwide mask mandate with a letter from their doctor -- though he says most people wear them anyways because of social stigma. 

"He's never heard of anyone intentionally getting infected, especially with a vaccine coming soon. 'That is possible. But on the other hand, I think it's also unfair to people who have had the infection. Why should they not be allowed to travel freely?' he said. 'I think it's a question of justice, basically. If you have the medical condition that you are not spreading or having the virus, you're not a risk to the environment, then you should be sort of recognized for that.' Iceland is also in talks with the other Nordic countries -- Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Norway -- so that people with that exemption can travel freely without restrictions....  

"Thorolfur was unaware of Hungary's policy. The central European country has had virtually nothing to say about the success or failure of its unique exemption, what science it's based on, and how it weighed the pros and cons. The Hungarian government declined interview requests and sent only a statement describing the policy itself. Many of the experts approached by CNN were unaware it was in place. It hasn't been widely discussed even inside Hungary.

"The World Health Organization (WHO) advised against immunity passports in April.... On Thursday, the WHO confirmed it has not changed its position, but, Regional Advisor Dr. Siddhartha Sankar Datta said it was looking to help countries implement electronic vaccination certificates."

Read more: https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/hungary-iceland-covid-immunity-passport-scn/index.html

How Iceland beat the coronavirus (for now)

 How Iceland Beat the Coronavirus | The New Yorker - Elizabeth Kolbert:

June 1, 2020 - "On the morning of Friday, February 28th, Ævar Pálmi Pálmason, a detective with the Reykjavík police department, was summoned by his boss. Iceland did not yet have a confirmed case of covid-19, but the country’s Department of Civil Protection and Emergency Management wanted to be prepared....'We were just talking' ... Pálmason recalled. 'And then, two hours later, we got the call.' A man who’d recently been skiing in the Dolomites had become the country’s first known coronavirus patient....

"Anyone who’d spent more than fifteen minutes near the man in the days before he’d experienced his first symptoms was considered potentially infected. ('Near' was defined as within a radius of two metres, or just over six feet.) [Pálmason's] team came up with a list of fifty-six names. By midnight, all fifty-six contacts had been located and ordered to quarantine themselves for fourteen days.

"The first case was followed by three more cases, then by six, and then by an onslaught. By mid-March, confirmed covid cases in Iceland were increasing at a rate of sixty, seventy, even a hundred a day. As a proportion of the country’s population, this was far faster than the rate at which cases in the United States were growing. The number of people the tracing team was tracking down, meanwhile, was rising even more quickly.... All were sent into quarantine.... If you were returning to Iceland from overseas, you also got a call: put yourself in quarantine. At the same time, the country was aggressively testing for the virus — on a per-capita basis, at the highest rate in the world.

"Iceland never imposed a lockdown. Only a few types of businesses — night clubs and hair salons, for example — were ever ordered closed. Hardly anyone in Reykjavík wears a mask. And yet, by mid-May, when I went to talk to Pálmason, the tracing team had almost no one left to track. During the previous week, in all of Iceland, only two new coronavirus cases had been confirmed. The country hadn’t just managed to flatten the curve; it had, it seemed, virtually eliminated it....

"Iceland, which has three hundred and sixty-five thousand residents — about half the population of Denver — is a famously tight-knit country. Almost everyone, quite literally, is related to everyone else, and if two people want to know how exactly their families are intertwined they can consult a genealogy database run by an Icelandic biotech firm called deCODE Genetics. Iceland was able to test so many people because, at the height of the outbreak, deCODE turned its state-of-the-art facilities over to screening for the virus.... Iceland’s university hospital was already testing people who had symptoms of covid-19. But by testing people who had no symptoms, or only very mild ones, deCODE picked up many cases that otherwise would have been missed. These cases, too, were referred to the tracing team. By May 17th, Iceland had tested 15.5 per cent of its population for the virus. In the U.S., the figure was 3.4 per cent.

"Meanwhile, deCODE was also sequencing the virus from every Icelander whose test had come back positive. As the virus is passed from person to person, it picks up random mutations. By analyzing these, geneticists can map the disease’s spread.... By sequencing the virus from every person infected, researchers at deCODE could also make inferences about how it had spread. 'One of the very interesting things is that, in all our data, there are only two examples where a child infected a parent,' [deCODE head Kári] Stefánsson told me. 'But there are lots of examples where parents infected children.'

"[W]hen I asked Stefánsson about the Icelandic government’s response to covid-19, he had only kind words. 'This was done in an extremely balanced way,' he said at one point. 'And I think the authorities did pretty much everything right.' At another point, he told me, 'The remarkable thing in this whole affair is that in Iceland it has been run entirely by the public-health authorities. They came up with the plan, and they just instituted it. And we were fortunate that our politicians managed to control themselves.'"

Read more: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/06/08/how-iceland-beat-the-coronavirus

Blaer Bjarkardottir wins right to use her given name

Blaer Bjarkardottir, Icelandic Teen, Wins Right To Use Her Given Name - Gidjon Helgason, Huffington Post::

January 31, 2012 - "A 15-year-old Icelandic girl has been granted the right to legally use the name given to her by her mother, despite the opposition of authorities and Iceland's strict law on names.

"Reykjavik District Court ruled Thursday that the name "Blaer" can be used.... The decision overturns an earlier rejection by Icelandic authorities who declared it was not a proper feminine name. Until now, Blaer Bjarkardottir had been identified simply as "Girl" in communications with officials.

"'I'm very happy,' she said after the ruling. 'I'm glad this is over. Now I expect I'll have to get new identity papers. Finally I'll have the name Blaer in my passport.'

"Like a handful of other countries, including Germany and Denmark, Iceland has official rules about what a baby can be named. Names are supposed to fit Icelandic grammar and pronunciation rules....

"The court found that based on testimony and other evidence, that the name could be used by both males and females and that Blaer had a right to her own name under Iceland's constitution and Europe's human rights conventions."

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/31/blaer-bjarkardottir--icel_n_2589657.html
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