How France tackled vaccine hesitancy

ACROSS EUROPE this summer, vaccine take-up began to slow after the willing got their covid-19 shots. Persuading the hesitant was always going to be harder. Few places looked more challenging than France. In December 2020 61% of the French said they would not get jabbed—twice the share in America. Yet what happened this summer has become a case study in how to nudge a reluctant population.

On July 12th, to general surprise, President Emmanuel Macron announced the introduction of a covid-19 passport. Only those who were fully vaccinated, or had a negative test result, would be allowed into cinemas, sports stadiums, restaurants, bars, shopping centres and nightclubs, or on long-distance trains and flights. Employees in such places would also need the pass sanitaire—a QR code, in either digital or paper form—or face suspension. Vaccination would be compulsory for health-care workers. Mr Macron was taking a big gamble. He risked further dividing the country, and provoking the sort of national rebellion for which the French are famed.

The outcry was indeed instant. Politicians of all stripes denounced the measure as discriminatory. Marine Le Pen, who has remodelled herself as a champion of liberty (though she is not an anti-vaxxer), called it a “serious violation of individual freedom”, and voted...