Man tried to use fake arm for his Covid vaccine - and was immediately busted

An Italian man was busted after using a fake arm to get the Covid-19 vaccine and bypass the country’s mandate.

The 50-year-old purchased a silicone prosthetic body suit that wrapped around his neck and torso. He wore the suit to his vaccine appointment at a center in Biella, a town in Italy’s northern Piemonte region near Turin.

The man aimed to avoid the shot, but still get a proof-of-vaccination card known in Italy as the “Green Pass.”

At the appointment, the man signed a consent form and presented his arm to the health care worker.

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Filippa Bua, 60, told Italian newspaper La Repubblica that she immediately realized something was off. She asked the man to remove his shirt, which revealed the prosthetic.

Bua said she was suspicious of the color of the man’s arm, and the way the skin felt. There were also no visible veins.

“At first I thought I made a mistake — that it was a patient with an artificial arm,” she said.

“Would you have imagined that I’d have such a physique?” the man jested, after removing his shirt.

Piemonte president Alberto Cirio released a joint statement with regional health chief Luigi Icardi and praised Bua’s “promptness and skill” for ruining the man’s nefarious plans. He will now have to “respond to the judiciary.”

La Repubblica speculated that the same man may have tweeted a photo of silicone body suit available for purchase on Amazon alongside the caption, “If I go with this, will they notice?

“Maybe beneath the silicone I’ll even put on some extra clothes to avoid the needle reaching my real arm,” the Twitter user allegedly added.

The “Super Green Pass”, which requires proof of vaccination in order to enter venues like nightclubs, restaurants, and theaters, is set to take effect in Italy on Monday,