Immunity Status Passports – Watering the Green Shoots of Recovery

By Editorial Team

The idea of immunity status passports has been debated amongst governments since the start of the pandemic. Against warnings from critics of potential discriminatory, non-inclusive and anti-privacy practices, two countries are forging ahead with plans for their roll out. This has been followed more recently by the European Union. Like many countries around the world, Denmark is desperate to reopen the parts of its economy frozen by the pandemic. The kingdom of under 6 million people has become one of the most efficient vaccination distributors in Europe and aims to have offered its whole population a jab by June 2021. As early as July 2020, Denmark was offering its citizens a service to apply for a COVID PCR-test through the country’s national health website which, if the test came back negative, meant they could download a document certificating the result. At the beginning of February 2021, Denmark’s government said it was joining forces with businesses to develop a digital passport that would show whether the holder has been vaccinated against COVID-19, in an effort to facilitate and revive travel. Danish Finance Minister Morten Boedskov told a news conference that ‘in three, four months, a digital corona passport will be ready for use in, for example, business travel’. ‘It will be the extra passport that you will be able to have on your mobile phone that documents that you have been vaccinated,’ Boedskov said. ‘We can be among the first in the world to have it and can show it to the rest of the world.’ Unlike tourist destination countries such as Greece and Spain that are running immunity status pilots, the objective is not to attract foreign holiday makers this summer. The move to add immunity status to the personally identifiable information on Denmark's planned passport would be rolled out first to business travellers, eager to rekindle the commerce with foreign markets that accounts for a third of its GDP. Once the business sector is up and running, the hope is that Denmark's hospitality and mass entertainment sectors can then adopt the COVID passport. Boedskov said it was ‘absolutely crucial for us to be able to restart Danish society so that companies can get back on track. Many Danish companies are global companies with the whole world as a market.’ As a first step, citizens in Denmark will be able to check a Danish health website for official confirmation of whether they have been vaccinated. As one of the world's most digitised countries, Denmark is ideally placed to become a testing ground for this new approach, drawing on public and private collaboration.

COVID-19 Certificate

Pass Israel has been offering COVID vaccinations to all over-16s since the beginning of February 2021. In a population of roughly 9 million this is no mean feat, and the country has lost no time in using its successful vaccination programme to underpin a return to more normal life. From the beginning of March 2021, gyms, theatres, hotels, concert venues, and synagogues registered under the ‘green passport’ programme have been able to operate and only green passport holders will be allowed to enter these premises. To qualify for a green passport a citizen will have to have been vaccinated or have recovered from COVID. ‘We are giving a huge line to vaccinators,’ Health Minister Yuli Edelstein said during a recent briefing. ‘This is the first step back to an almost normal life.’ Edelstein added that soon there will be places of work that will have to require their staff be vaccinated or else undergo a COVID test every 48 hours. The green passport is granted to those who are a week past the second coronavirus vaccination, or to the around 740,000 people recovered from the virus who currently are not eligible for the vaccine. Rona Kaiser, Vice President of Information Technologies for the Health Ministry, explained that the passport can be downloaded via the trafficlight smartphone application, the Health Ministry’s traffic-light website, or via the ministry call centre. To access the green passport, you have to submit personally identifiable information including (travel) passport number and date of birth. If you apply on the ministry’s website, you will be issued with a printable green passport certificate that includes a scannable secure QR code with a digital signature. When you arrive at a store or other place of business, you will be asked to present your green passport. The printout can be presented for scanning, or the app can be opened, and the digital confirmation presented. You will also be asked to present your ID card. The Israel green passport will be valid for six months, from one week after the second dose.

COVID-19 Certificate

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COVID-19 Certificate

Pass COVID-19 Certificate

Pass European Commission proposals

On 17 March, Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, introduced draft legislation proposing a Digital Green Certificate (DGC) to facilitate safe free movement inside the EU during the pandemic. The DGC will serve as an assurance that a person has been vaccinated against COVID, received a negative test result, or recovered from COVID. The certificate will, in effect, comprise three distinct certificates:

Vaccination certificates – stating brand of the vaccine used, date and place of inoculation and number of doses administered.

Negative test certificates (either a NAAT/RT-PCR test or a rapid antigen test). Self-tests will be excluded for the time being.

Medical certificates for people who have recovered from COVID-19 in the last 180 days. According to a statement from the Commission, the DGC will be free of charge, bilingual, interoperable, secure, non-discriminatory, and available in digital and physical format via QR codes. These three examples add further validity to this White Paper’s starting assumptions that some kind of immunity status passport is inevitable and that security should be built in from the start; sentiments strongly echoed by Lars Ramme Nielsen of Denmark's Chamber of Commerce. ‘If we do nothing, if we sit and wait, nothing will happen,’ he said, ‘If you start when COVID has left society, it will be too late. With this project we're very positive we will have a summer of joy, of football, of music. So better get started sooner, now, to plan.’