Letter from Grappe to MEPs regarding the vaccine passport

Madam, Mister, Member of Parliament, 

On April 28, you will be called to vote urgently on the draft regulation establishing a digital green certificate for European citizens (COM (2021) 130).

This project does not aim, contrary to what it claims, to facilitate the free movement of citizens in the European area. Under the pretext of harmonization, it legitimizes the right of each member state to organize segregation between those who agree to submit to so-called
and ineffective and those who, even in perfect health, and in all legality, do not accept it.

We ask you to realize the unprecedented importance of the vote that is being asked of you and to reject this project.
To those who believe, certainly in good faith, that it is possible to amend it, to make it acceptable by one or another improvement, we say that they fall into a pernicious trap.

Because this regulation sets up a new society, totally incompatible with the values enshrined in the European treaties and the charter of fundamental rights, a society of surveillance, social control and discrimination. This project is pernicious because it plays on the fear of a pandemic that it is perfectly possible to curb through a prevention campaign aimed at reinforcing the immune system of everyone and the provision of therapeutic means recognized as effective at the first signs of the disease. In this regard, hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin, drugs known to
with minor or even negligible side effects.

These drugs have only one drawback: they are no longer protected by a patent and therefore no longer present any financial interest for pharmaceutical companies motivated above all by the lure of profit. The European Commission (with the experts who advise it), ideologically committed to a techno-scientific vision of the common good, has designed a legislative tool at their service that locks us all into a world dominated by multinationals and assigns us to the role of decerebrate consumers in the service of growth.

In support of our indictment of this disguised vaccine passport project, we also draw your attention to the irrelevance of the criteria abusively presented as scientific guarantees of the health and non-contagiousness of the certificate holder.

1. On vaccines against covid. Recent news has reminded us of a fact that has been skilfully kept under wraps in order to speed up the process of mass vaccination of the population: experimental vaccines that have been granted (wrongly) provisional marketing authorization, since phase 3 clinical trials are still underway. The serious side effects that have occurred with two of the four vaccines that have been granted this authorization (the Astra Zeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines) have shown that the EMEA had underestimated the risks.
   A statement signed by a large group of leading physicians and scientists*⁽¹⁾ challenges the claims of the European Medicines Agency, which rejected the group’s concerns expressed in an open letter sent on March 1⁽²⁾.
   The EMEA considers coagulation and bleeding problems to be minor and rare events, concluding that the benefit/risk ratio of these vaccines is well established. According to this Doctors for Covid Ethics Group, the recorded cases of life-threatening cerebral venous thrombosis (CVT) after vaccination are probably just the tip of a huge iceberg. This makes vaccination and coronavirus dangerous for young and healthy age groups, for whom, in the absence of vaccination, Covid-19 poses no substantial risk.
   Even if we are skeptical about this statement, it seems obvious to us that we should take it seriously and analyze the situation without prejudice rather than rush headlong into a generalized vaccination and even less make it the sesame for a newfound freedom.
   We cannot ignore either the well-documented problem of the inevitable appearance of more contagious or even more aggressive variants such as the P1 variant (known as Brazilian) against which the current vaccines already seem to be ineffective. Finally, it is essential to remember that vaccination, although it initially protects the person vaccinated, does not prevent him or her from spreading the virus. Unless we are blind to a reality that is already very visible, we risk being imprisoned in a logic of vaccine consumption that is as dangerous as it is useless, for the greater profit of pharmaceutical multinationals and the satisfaction of growth fetishists
   economic.
2. On PCR tests. It is true that, in principle, vaccination is not required, provided that regular PCR tests are carried out, which are supposed to guarantee, in case of a negative result, the non-contagiousness of the person tested. While PCR testing can diagnose a sick person in a short period of time, its relevance for asymptomatic people is questionable.
   The published protocol for the detection and diagnosis of 2019-nCov currently in use has been reviewed point by point by a group of independent researchers, who have concluded that the RT PCR test for SARS-COV2 has 10 flaws
   and methodological level. As a result, the test leads to many false positive results⁽³⁾. How, under these conditions, can this test be used as a criterion of non-contagiousness? Among them are the former vice-president and scientific director of Pfizer, Michael Yeadon, and Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg, former president of the Health Commission of the Council of Europe.
3. On proof of recovery. Proof of recovery is the third element of the certificate, based on antibody testing. The certificate could be renewed as long as the person concerned can show an analysis showing the presence of these antibodies. It is absurd and scientifically invalid to ignore the fact that many world-renowned clinical immunologists have shown that about 30% of people are initially already immune without necessarily having specific antibodies. In conclusion, it appears that it is proposed to set up a vast hygienic system of social control and control over the personal data of each European, without the slightest guarantee of effectiveness for public health. We therefore urge you to reject such a project which would mark an unprecedented democratic and social regression.

Pierre Stein, president of the ASBL Grappe Belgique
Paul Lannoye, Doctor of Science, former vice-president of the Health Committee of the European Parliament, and former president of the Green Group, founding member of Grappe.