Hi all — this has been alluded to in some threads but I wanted to put it here straight out.
For persons aged 16 and up, as of Monday Jan 24, France changes from the pass sanitaire to the passe vaccinal.
What does this mean, practically?
For those who are fully vaccinated, not much. The pass vaccinal is granted on the basis of a full vaccination scheme, just as the pass sanitaire was. If you already had a pass sanitaire, it’s the same thing.
For those who aren’t vaccinated though, they have a problem. Up until now, in place of the pass sanitaire acquired via proof of vaccination, they had the possibility to take a Covid test and get a temporary pass sanitaire with their negative result (When this first started, the negative test result was good for a pass sanitaire for 72 hours; later it was revised to only be good for 24 hours).
As of Monday, the unvaccinated will NOT be able to use a negative test to get your way around being vaccinated (or having your proof of vaccination) to get into museums, restaurants, cafes, long-distance trains, airplanes, etc.
Children aged 12 to 15 continue to have the possibility of getting a negative test as a temporary passé sanitaire/passe vaccinal.
All of this of course is only for your activities once you are in country. The rules for entering France remain the same. Basically to come as a tourist, you have to be fully vaccinated. Those who aren’t vaccinated have to meet one of a very few stringent exceptions (no tourist will meet these exceptions, so the practical effect is that France isn’t allowing in unvaccinated American/Canadian tourists).