Covid-19 vaccine ‘passports’ raise ethical concerns and logistical hurdles

A vaccine passport was launched in Israel last week allowing those vaccinated to go to hotels and gyms. Saudi Arabia is now issuing an app-based health passport for those vaccinated, while the government of Iceland is issuing vaccine passports to facilitate foreign travel. Last month, President Biden issued executive orders asking government agencies to assess the feasibility of creating Covid-19 digital vaccination certificates.

Proponents of the plans say they will reopen battered economies, even as vaccines continue to be rolled out, allowing people to enjoy leisure activities and work safely in the knowledge that they won’t harm others or put themselves at risk. It can also encourage people to take the picture.

But the concept may be fraught with pitfalls. It could discriminate against minority communities, who, according to national surveys, are less likely to accept the vaccines, or young people, who are less likely to be prioritized to receive them. There are questions about the ethics of granting companies access to people’s medical records.

“What underlies all this is, what are you going to use it for?” said Melinda Mills, director of the Leverhulme Center for Demographic Science at the University of Oxford. Is it for international travel? Is it to get a job? Is it to buy milk? “

Some health authorities are concerned that vaccine passports could give people a false sense of security. For example, it is not clear whether vaccines prevent people from becoming infected and spreading the disease or whether vaccinations become less effective due to mutations in the virus. Scientists race for answers to these questions.

In the European Union, leaders agreed at a virtual summit on Thursday to come up with an electronic vaccine certificate within three months that could work across the bloc. But disagreements remain as to what a certificate could be used for. Some, like Austria and Greece, want it to be some kind of passport that vaccinated people can travel with.

Others, including France, Belgium and the Netherlands, are more skeptical. French President Emmanuel Macron said on Thursday evening that he does not want young people who do not receive vaccinations for the time being to be discriminated against.

The World Health Organization has set up a working group to look at how best to create a digital vaccination certificate.

Israel and the UK, two major countries with advanced vaccination programs, are at the forefront of the debate. The UK aims to have all adults vaccinated by the end of July. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced that an investigation into immunity certificates will be completed before mid-June.

Israel started on Saturday evening to issue so-called “green passports” that allow vaccinated people to enter gyms, concerts and hotels. Later, the passes will be used at restaurants and bars when they reopen in the coming weeks.

Officials have described the green passports as important tools in their efforts to encourage as many of the population as possible to get vaccinated. So far, 50% of the population in Israel has received at least one injection of a vaccine.

The green passports can be found on the website of the Ministry of Health or on a mobile app and contain a barcode and a personal identification number.

The project is not without controversy. Although vaccination is not mandatory in Israel, parliament passed a law on Wednesday allowing the province’s health ministry to identify unvaccinated people to local authorities. Other measures may require frequent testing for those who have not been vaccinated.

Health Minister Yuli Edelstein said he is considering proposing legislation allowing employers to block unvaccinated workers from coming to work, although those decisions are not final.

The Israeli Public Health Union warned that sharing people’s vaccination status raises privacy concerns. Other experts have raised questions about whether people’s personal information can be used to target them later with political ads.

In the UK, where more than a third of the population has received at least one injection of the vaccine, the government is legally prohibited from forcing Britons to get vaccinated. At first, ministers said they were against vaccine passports. But in recent weeks, the government has changed course.

Mr Johnson said it is likely that people will need a vaccination certificate to travel abroad, just as some countries require a certificate of yellow fever immunization. But whether the government should require certificates to access leisure activities is not clear, he said.

‘We haven’t had this kind of thing before. We never thought in terms of something that you have to show to go to a pub or theater, ”he said this week. “There are deep and complex problems that we need to investigate.”

To avoid fears that those who refuse vaccinations would become second-class citizens, the government is investigating whether a certificate can also be issued if someone tests negative for Covid-19.

Officials are investigating whether a vaccine or test certificate can be displayed on an app developed by the country’s National Health Service. That can take a long time, says Elliot Jones, a researcher at the Ada Lovelace Institute, a British research foundation. It took the UK government more than six months to build a Covid-19 track and trace app.

Meanwhile, the private sector can take matters into its own hands. British holiday operator Saga PLC said customers must prove they have received two shots of vaccination before boarding its cruise ships. International business machines Corp.

has developed a digital health card that allows people to share health records with employers or other companies.

In Israel, some business leaders say they will demand that workers be vaccinated. Shai Wininger, co-founder of the New York-based insurance company Lemonade Inc.,

wrote on Facebook that he will only meet face-to-face with vaccinated people.

Large shopping centers Ltd.

, which operates shopping centers across Israel, said this month that it will allow unvaccinated workers, suppliers and guests access to management offices starting in March.

Once a majority of a country’s population has been vaccinated, the question is whether the social and economic costs of vaccine passports are worth the potentially small reduction in transmission they could yield, said Mr. Jones.

If vaccinations keep infection rates in check, he asked, “Is it really worth it for all this hassle?”

—Laurence Norman in Brussels contributed to this article.

Write to Max Colchester at [email protected] and Felicia Schwartz at [email protected]