Will Entrance to Croatian Events be Permitted Only With "Covid Passes"?

June the 11th, 2021 - The controversial issue of Croatian ''covid passports'' is being talked about more and more lately. As decisions surrounding their implementation begin, could attending Croatian events only with the presentation of a valid vaccination document become a reality? The topic is already being discussed surrounding football match spectators.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, the European Parliament voted on the introduction of digital covid-certificates yesterday, which will be in official use throughout the European Union from the 1st of July, 2021. Croatia has already introduced this certificate in its own national system, and in one single week, despite many issues, more than 100 thousand people successfully had theirs approved for use.

In addition to making the process far easier when crossing EU borders as the pandemic continues, the plan is for this certificate to serve as proof of having overcome COVID-19, having been vaccinated or having a negative PCR test for other purposes, such as entering Croatian events such as concerts.

As the Croatian events sector is finally beginning to feel some optimism after a long time, and it seems that covid-check verification will be integrated into the ticket sales process.

"Yesterday we did an analysis and we saw that in the last month the number of tickets sold is three times higher compared to the same period last year. This shows some serious optimism,'' said Berislav Marszalek, the owner of the platform for the mediation in ticket sales for RTL Danas/Today.

There will soon be more optimism because the ''old way'' of attending Croatian events such as performances and concerts is closer than ever to returning. In that sense, without needing to adhere to epidemiological measures, people will be able to attend as they did before the pandemic, as long as they have proof of their recovery from the disease, proof of vaccination or proof of having a negative PCR test result. A person's digital covid certificate will be scanned along with their ticket.

“The goal is to integrate the tickets, meaning checking those tickets with checking those covid passes so that the process is quick, easy and in all done one place. We don't want to slow down the process further at the entrance,'' explained Marszalek.

This is a proposal from the Croatian events industry that has been sent to the Croatian Institute of Public Health through the Ministry of Culture. The first rehearsal concert without measures has already been arranged, but the options for its realisation are still on the table.

"There were, in accordance with the conversations we had with the community, some proposals for a concert at Jarun, or one at the Zagreb Arena. Exactly where and what the first concert will look like is hard to say now. What does it depend on? This primarily depends on our talks with the CNIPH on when we'll be ready to register these covid passes,'' said Kresimir Partl, State Secretary at the Ministry of Culture and Media.

A decision by the end of the week?

“The National Civil Protection Directorate is currently considering passing these national rules for the use of digital covid certification and I guess we'll have some sort of national solution for that by the end of the week and then we'll be able to discuss where and how the concerts would be organised. I hope that we'll know something more about it on Friday,'' said the director of the CNIPH, Krunoslav Capak.

For all you need to know about coronavirus specific to Croatia, including travel, border and quarantine rules, as well as the locations of vaccination points and testing centres across the country, make sure to bookmark our dedicated COVID-19 section and select your preferred language.