Hungary is to present re-opening plan shortly - leak

The portal said a decision on the re-opening of the economy will be taken after the conclusion of the 'national consultation', which means

we will learn what this plan is shortly.

A decision is also to be made about what privileges those with an immunity certificate will have. The certificates are issued to those that have been vaccinated against COVID-19 and those who have recovered from the infection.

The portal has learned that anything related to the 'vaccine passport' is secondary to the vaccination campaign. Almost 14% of the population have got their first COVID-19 jab up to date. The portal said that if plans are seen through, everyone will be inoculated by the end of May.

The portal also reminded that the Council of Europe and the European Parliament will both need to approve 'vaccine passport' regulations, which would take at least two months. Origo said that until then all member states would be under pressure to use more vaccines than just those approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA).

Note that this national consultation business is a political tool. If you think about it, no one with a sane mind would trust the general population with decisions like this. Regardless of what the government suggests, Joe Bloggs will never be and very well shouldn't be paid heed to when it comes to literally life or death issues such a pandemic and its management. It can only be hoped that the PM listens to scientists and experts rather than his hairdresser, plumber, or gardener. Not to mention that the results of these surveys are not public and the questions are rather rhetorical – and often filled with fearmongering and scapegoating, targeting Brussels, George Soros or migrants, for example.

And that's only one side of the coin. The other is that at this point there's no one who could responsibly forecast when the pandemic will peak or start to wind down. No one. Any projection using the words 'hopefully', or 'in a best-case scenario', or 'if we're lucky' is nothing more than wishful thinking. There are no scientific data that would underpin estimates that re-opening could be possible in two, three, or four weeks. The pandemic remains in an upward trend and the vaccination campaign is too sluggish to make an immediate or even a short-term impact. Some immunity builds up weeks after the first shot and maximum immunity is reached a couple of weeks after the second shot. What would help curb the spread of coronavirus is more stringent lockdown measures. Re-opening is a pipe dream in the short term and any remark or report suggesting it is imminent is smoke and mirrors.

Cover photo: MTI/EPA/Focke Strangmann