GCs relevant to the vaccination exemption at the end of July 2021.

At the end of July CoMin issued four directions under the new powers under the PHR to specify details for the vaccination exemption.

GC 2021/0084 adds Johnson and Johnson’s Janssen to the list of qualifying vaccination, with a two week period required following the full completion of the course of vaccination.

GC 2021/0086 departs from the English categories 1-3 by classing France as a category 3 country for the purposes of regulation 5A (so making travellers from France unable to use the vaccination exemption; but perhaps not invalidating vaccinations received in France – in any  case see below), and category 2 for the purposes of 5B (allowing children travelling with adults to whom the vaccination exemption applies). My reading of this is that a child who has been in France within ten days of entering the Isle of Man can make use of the secondary vaccination exemption so long as the fully vaccinated parent or guardian with who they travel has not been in France within ten days. So a fully vaccinated parent could travel to the UK to collect a child who has been, say, on a school trip in France; but could not collect them directly from France without losing the vaccination exemption.

GC 2021/0087 adds four clinical trials to the vaccination exemption, allowing those who have completed vaccination with Valneva, Novovax, Com-COV and Com-COV 2 more than 14 days before entering the Isle of Man to make use of the vaccination exemption.

 GC 2021/0088 deals with the issue of where a qualifying vaccination is received. The Regulations limit the vaccination exemption to vaccinations received in “relevant countries”. This direction defines relevant country as “any country”. So, so long as the other requirements for the vaccination exemption are met, the location in which the vaccine was received is no longer significant. This seems sensible, but does mean that vaccinations received in any of the more than 190 countries of the world will satisfy the exemption, which may pose administrative problems. Bhutan for instance, has been very active in providing its population with complete courses of vaccinations accepted by the PHRs. I have no idea what Bhutan’s proof of vaccination looks like.