The pointless tyranny of Italy’s Covid pass

While most European countries, especially Britain, are relaxing their Covid restrictions, Italy which has the toughest of the lot, this week made them tougher still – even though the data shows they are futile.

Perhaps it is because Italy is a country where fortune tellers and faith healers are a multi-billion pound industry that it has the most draconian vaccine passport regime in Europe. Either way, mass psychosis blinds its politicians and people from the truth.

In the UK, bogus claims by government scientific advisers about the need for, and benefits of, lockdowns were in the end convincingly demolished and The Spectator played a significant role in the process. It is high time that similar bogus claims about vaccine passports are debunked as well.

There can be no better place to start this debunking process than Italy.

The justification for Italy’s vaccine passport regime – called ‘Il Green Pass’ – when introduced last August was that it would increase vaccine uptake, create safe spaces for the vaccinated, and thereby reduce Covid cases, hospitalisations and deaths.