Today, August 30, the EU made a non-binding recommendation to its member countries to ban non-essential travel from a handful of countries, including the United States.
The EU had added the US to its “safe travel” list in June but, because of increasing COVID cases, the US was really outside the parameters of that list for the past month or so. This move had been expected.
Because the EU decision today is non-binding, it will be up to each country to determine its own rules and there are excellent indications vaccinated travelers will continue to be allowed.
Germany
As of August 16, Germany had already moved the United States to its “high risk” list. However, it made an exemption for leisure travelers who have been vaccinated. This is good news as it suggests a likely path forward for Germany (and other countries).
Italy
The Italian government has not yet made a clear indication of what it will do but there are two very good indicators that vaccinated leisure travelers will continue to be allowed to enter the country:
- Italy recently removed the five-day quarantine on leisure travelers from the UK who are both vaccinated and present a negative test. This is a sample model for US travelers too.
- The Italian ministry of health over the past two days added a new rule (that has not been publicized much at all) requiring US travelers to present a negative COVID test even for vaccinated travelers. This is good news as it likely means this is the direction Italy will be taking: vaccine and negative test.
Other Countries
We at Zephyr Adventures are primarily focused on the areas we have tours running this fall. If you have plans to visit other European countries, we suggest you carefully monitor the news for those countries.
Our 2021 European Tours
We have one tour ongoing now in Ireland. We have many other tours upcoming in Germany and Italy. At this point, we expect to know more over the next few days but do believe vaccinated US travelers will be allowed to enter these countries and the tours will be running.
