Italy waives pre-arrival COVID-19 testing regulations

According to the National Tourist Board, all fully vaccinated international tourists entering the country will no longer be requested to take Covid-19 tests.

Travellers will be allowed to enter Italy by just showing proof of complete vaccination scheme. The vaccinations should not be older than nine months. Tourists also have the possibility to show medical certificate of receiving a booster shot before visiting.

With this decision, Italy is the latest European country to relax its border protocols. The change came into effect on the 1st of March.

Minister of Health of Italy, Roberto Speranza, explained:

“From March 1 for arrivals from all non-European countries, the same rules will be in force as already provided for European countries. One of the conditions of the green pass will be sufficient for entry into Italy: vaccination certificate, recovery certificate, or negative test.”

As for unvaccinated travellers, they will be required to show recovery proof no older than 6 months, a negative PCT test taken not more than 72 hours prior entry or a rapid antigen test report not older than 48 hours. Nevertheless, all visitors will have to fill the Passenger Locator Form before entering the country.

Travellers failing to comply with the regulations will be quarantined for a period of 5 days.

Complying tourists will be offered a digital Covid-19 super green pass necessary for hotel accommodation, transportation and more.  

The decision of relaxing travel rules follows the recommendation of the Council of the European Union.

Nevertheless, rules on wearing face masks while in indoor spaces remain unchanged, as well as in extremely crowded public spaces. Regulations regardless wearing protective face covers in outdoor uncongested public spaces in Italy have been relaxed since February 11th.

On the other hand, France has also joined the list of countries that have removed testing requirements for vaccinated travellers, while Iceland had dropped all Covid-19 related restrictions earlier this week.

 

Source: timesofindia.indiatimes.com, thelocal.it