In France, this Wednesday, January 12, the Senate adopted at first reading the bill establishing the vaccination pass. Once this text comes into force, a negative test will no longer be sufficient to go to the cinema, to a bar or to take the train. The pressure is increasing, therefore, on the unvaccinated, who number around 5 million. Some might be tempted to get false passes. At the beginning of the year, the police had flushed out nearly 200,000.
It is difficult to know how many counterfeit passes are currently circulating. The authorities do not risk any estimate. One figure, however, reveals the scale of the phenomenon: there are 5% of false vaccines among hospitalized patients, according to the Minister of Health, Olivier Véran.
Paul *, in his thirties from Paris, has had his since December. Sitting on the terrace of a cafe, he opens the government application on his phone AllAntiCovid and shows RFI the precious sesame. ” There is my name, my date of birth, the two Pfizer doses. It works perfectly. I have traveled with it, taken the plane, crossed borders. I went to bars “Says the young man who refuses to be injected with a vaccine on which we lack perspective, he believes. Paul is convinced that since he is young and in good health, he will not have a severe form of the disease. But that doesn’t stop him from being careful, even more so than a vaccinated person, he says. When he has business meetings or goes to see his parents, he gets tested first. With his false real pass, he does not pay. Paul is indeed officially vaccinated. He received his certificate on his Social Security account, his Ameli account. For the third dose, he will proceed in the same way.
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Officially vaccinated without having received doses
In addition to counterfeit vaccine passports, it is extremely easy to obtain false certificates of recovery, false negative tests or even a third party pass. This is what Paul did at first. He was juggling the documents of two friends. When at the end of last year, the government announced that identity checks were going to be tightened, it decided to get a fake pass in his name. A simple conversation between colleagues put him on the trail of a person capable of providing him with one, for 30 euros. Paul got a good deal. On the social networks, prices are around 300-400 euros. On Telegram, for the end of year celebrations, there were promotions at 200 euros.
Behind these frauds, there may be health professionals. Several doctors, pharmacists or employees of vaccination centers have already been convicted. But more often than not, traffickers act behind their backs, by hacking into their professional accounts. ” It’s disconcertingly easy, absolutely abnormal », Says Maître Christophe Bruschi, who represents a 23-year-old young woman prosecuted for having created hundreds of false passes. ” There are tutorials on the internet. You first go to the Doctolib website (Editor’s note: digital platform for making medical appointments) where you get a doctor’s RPPS number. Professionals are in fact registered in a shared register. Then, with this number, you go to Ameli’s site and you get in touch with this doctor. He thinks that it is Social Security who contacts him and therefore agrees to open a session. It is at the level of a college student! “. Master Bruschi’s client faces five years in prison and a fine of 75,000 euros. A doctor or pharmacist also risks radiation.
Fine and jail time
Fake pass users, too, risk a lot. The law establishing the vaccination pass toughens the penalties. Holding a false pass will be punished by five years’ imprisonment and a fine of 75,000 euros. Presenting another person’s pass or lending your own pass will be punished with a fine of 1,000 euros. Sanctions that will be lifted if you get vaccinated in the month following your arrest.
Nothing to impress Paul who does not care about breaking the law. ” I have no qualms. If I get arrested, I think I’ll just get a wake-up call. I’ll pay the fine if I have to. It doesn’t stress me at all. They must already catch me. I know a lot of people who have fake passes. I won’t be the only one. And then the authorities will attack the one who made the fakes more than me. “
The government has decided to strengthen controls and cyber-investigations because, as Olivier Véran recalled on Monday, “ the false health pass kills “. At the end of October, a 57-year-old woman died in a hospital in Garches, near Paris. She had a forged certificate and was unable to benefit from appropriate care for an unvaccinated person.
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* His first name has been changed at his request.