Exciting to think that this coming up weekend Italy is welcoming back all visitors across its borders with a few simple requirements: no more quarantine, with a big yes to the new national “Green Pass“. If you’ve contracted and recovered from Covid in recent months, tested negative to a Covid test 48 hours prior to arrival or gotten vaccinated against Covid, then you can more easily enter into Italy. Since April 26 the green pass has existed for moving within Italy’s orange and red regions, from May 15th, it will be extended to foreigners coming into Italy as well.
Italy’s Prime Minister Mario Draghi is confident that tourism will come back stronger than ever, with such clear and simple rules. Visitors can be assured of safe vacations as all businesses opening up across the country meet strict safety protocols that ensure we can move about without worries. Up until this Friday, most visitors had to follow 5 days of quarantine.
So where do you get the “Green Pass”? For now, it is simply the certificate you received that attests your Covid vaccination is complete, a certificate from your hospital after your recovery or the negative test results of your last Covid test.
Of course, visitors from some countries will still not be allowed into Italy, including visitors from Brazil, India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka which are currently on the “black list” as far as Covid cases go.
Italy opens up to countries from Europe, the UK and Israel…. but how about visitors from the US? It isn’t yet clear as a date has not been set for when visitors will be allowed from the States with no quarantine but it is possible for visitors from the US to come to Italy also starting May 17th for tourism. The big caveat is that you still need to quarantine for 10 days. Once the European-wide Green Pass comes into effect in mid-June, but hopefully before, visitors will be allowed in without a quarantine period if they meet the rules above. Source: NYT interview with Ursula von der Leyen
We’re looking forward to a return to traveling ourselves and look forward to seeing our cities come back alive over the coming up weeks! Hope to see you soon.
About Lourdes Flores
An American living in Florence for over 10 years, Lourdes continues to explore and discover new places in Tuscany with the eyes of a tourist but with the experience of living in Italy. She shares her experiences on this blog and website, particularly offering lots of travel planning help on the Forum!
