Health experts are deeply concerned

LONDON – Public health officials and civil liberties organizations are asking policy makers to resist requests for passports for coronavirus vaccines at a time when many countries are in the process of reviewing the introduction of digital passes.

The USA, the UK and the European Union are among those considering the possibility of introducing a digital passport that will allow citizens to show that they have been vaccinated against Covid-19.

The certificate system could be used for trips abroad, as well as to allow access to places like restaurants and bars.

A digital passport is believed to help spur an economic recovery as countries prepare to relax public health measures in the coming weeks. The struggling aviation industry, hit particularly hard by the spread of the virus last year, is among those calling on governments to implement legislation to support Covid’s vaccine passports.

Doctors and human rights groups, however, are deeply concerned.

Dr. Deepti Gurdasani, a clinical epidemiologist at Queen Mary University of London, told CNBC by phone that vaccine passports could be used inadvertently to provide “false guarantees” to tourists.

“I can see that they can be useful in the long term, but I have a lot of concerns about them being considered at this point, when I think the scientific evidence doesn’t support them. And there are a lot of ethical concerns about them that I think are legitimate,” said Gurdasani in Thursday.

Among these scientific concerns, Gurdasani said it is clear that the protection offered by coronavirus vaccines is “very” far from complete and “we know very little about the effectiveness of vaccines in preventing infections or even asymptomatic diseases against various variants that circulate in different countries”.

In addition, most countries do not have sufficient access to vaccines to immunize their populations, and Gurdasani warned that a certificate system similar to vaccine passports would discriminate against these populations “even more”.

President Joe Biden, on his first full day in office last month, outlined a 200-page national coronavirus pandemic strategy. The plan included a guideline for several government agencies to “assess the feasibility” of linking Covid vaccines to international vaccination certificates and producing digital versions of them.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has also ordered a review of vaccine passports, while the European Council is due to meet on Thursday to discuss the next steps for the launch of the EU vaccine and the movement across the bloc. 27 countries.

The International Air Travel Association, which represents around 290 airlines from around the world, has seen an increasing number of airlines apply for its so-called IATA Travel Pass. The initiative was designed to help passengers manage their travel plans and provide airlines and governments with evidence that they have been vaccinated or tested for Covid-19.

In a letter seen by EURACTIV, IATA reportedly asked EU leaders meeting on Thursday to approve vaccine passports and agree “on the crucial role of secure digital solutions, such as the IATA Travel Pass.” IATA was not immediately available for comment when contacted by CNBC on Thursday.

The World Health Organization is not interested in passports for vaccines. In a statement published on January 28, WHO officials said that governments “should not introduce proof of vaccination or immunity requirements for international travel as a condition of entry” at this time.

The United Nations health agency added: “Critical doubts remain about the effectiveness of vaccination in reducing transmission and limited availability of vaccines.”

A report published by the Economist Intelligence Unit last month projected that the majority of the adult population in advanced economies would be vaccinated in the middle of next year. In contrast, this schedule extends to the beginning of 2023 for many middle-income countries and until 2024 for some low-income countries.

This highlights the great divide between high and low income countries with regard to access to the vaccine.

“These so-called passports ensure that those who can prove they have immunity to the coronavirus can begin to return to normal life. Which begs the question – what about other people?” Liberty, the UK’s largest civil liberties organization, said in a press release earlier this month.

“Numerous suggestions for immunity passports have circulated. Some suggest that their use would be limited to international travel – others are less specific. Meanwhile, a variety of technologies have been launched, from QR codes to apps or even physical cards,” the statement continued.

“One thing that all suggestions left out is that it is impossible to have immunity passports that do not result in human rights abuses.”

Big Brother Watch, a UK-based rights and democracy group, also warned against using vaccine passports, citing implications for privacy and freedom of movement, among other issues.

In a report published on February 14 by the Science in Emergencies Tasking: Covid-19 (SET-C) group of the Royal Society, the UK’s national academy of sciences, university professors highlighted 12 issues that would need to be satisfied in order to deliver a passport from vaccine.

This included: accommodating the differences between vaccines in their effectiveness and changes in effectiveness against emerging Covid variants, being internationally standardized, being safe for personal data, meeting legal standards and meeting ethical standards.

“Understanding what a vaccine passport can be used for is a key issue – is it literally a passport to allow international travel or can it be used internally to allow greater freedoms for its holders?” Professor Melinda Mills, director of the University of Oxford’s Leverhulme Center for Demographic Sciences, said in the report.

“We need a broader discussion about the multiple aspects of a vaccine passport, from the science of immunity to data privacy, technical challenges and the ethics and legality of how it can be used,” said Mills.