Who is popular today?

Rishi Maharaj,
executive director of EquiGov Institute

On July 1 the European Union officially launched its EU digital covid certificate. This vaccine passport (formally known as the EU digital green certificate) provides digital proof whether a person has been vaccinated against covid19, received a negative test result or recovered from the virus. It also aims to facilitate safe and free movement in Europe during the covid19 pandemic by exempting holders from travel restrictions such as needing to quarantine.
While this passport is EU based, many countries around the world are currently examining similar measures as a way to prevent the spread of the virus and more importantly to stimulate travel and tourism particularly in the Caribbean.
Indeed, international travel has been on the back burner for over a year now, and as more people receive the covid19 vaccine, nations around the world are itching to reopen their borders. In a bid to kick-start the tourism industry, one by one, countries are introducing covid19 vaccine passports. Although the name can be misleading, this documentation comes in all shapes and sizes – we're already seeing physical certificates, digital forms, and QR codes within national apps.
At the present time, it is the World Health Organization’s (WHO) position that national authorities and conveyance operators should not introduce requirements of proof of covid19 vaccination for international travel as a condition for departure or entry, given that there are still critical unknowns regarding the efficacy of vaccination in reducing transmission. In addition, considering that there is limited availability of vaccines, preferential vaccination of travellers could result in inadequate supplies of vaccines for priority populations considered at high risk of severe covid19 disease.
Recent polls have shown that a majority of British people support vaccine passports. But this enthusiasm isn’t shared among young people, ethnic minorities, and those in poor areas—the same groups that have exhibited some of the lowest levels of vaccine confidence in the country.
Vaccination verification systems can collect and store the sensitive personal and health information of potentially millions of people. At minimum, a vaccine passport app will have to include personal information such as your name and contact information, as well as at least enough medical information to confirm that you have been vaccinated. To verify that information, a vaccine passport app is likely to have to interface with state vaccination registration databases or with medical records from health care providers.
Additionally, apart from international travel, many critics are of the view that passports may not only be used by travellers. The document could become a requirement for a range of other activities and facilities as well. From watching a movie, to eating a meal at a restaurant — citizens may be required to present their "vaccine passports" before they are permitted to enter some public spaces.
Critics of the vaccine passport have pointed out that apart from the obvious scientific shortcomings of such a system, using such a document could also be discriminatory. These documents have been criticised by human rights activists and data protection advocates, who have raised concerns about the privacy and data security issues associated with vaccine passports.
A number of vocal covid19 vaccine passport sceptics have said it is too early for countries to start pushing out such documents since data on the efficacy of vaccines in preventing people from contracting or passing on the deadly virus is still limited.
Another growing complication is the emergence of more virulent strains of the virus, such as the alpha, gamma and now prevalent delta strains and whether vaccines will be able to offer adequate protection against future variants as well.
Some experts have also said that these passports could lead to a global incentive for vaccinating international travellers before prioritising covid19 vaccine doses for poorer countries and swathes of at-risk communities around the world. Also, data security activists point out that the digital certificates can even be used by authorities to track the movement of their holders.
So while vaccine passports could help hasten the end of the pandemic, they also come with severe risks to privacy, equality and civil liberties. There are ways to design vaccine passports to preserve as much individual privacy as possible. But the problem with any solution is that we lack legal remedies for privacy violations and technological discrimination.
Getting the Caribbean and the world vaccinated is a necessary and critical step to stopping this virus. We can't reopen society or the economy until we reach herd immunity. Vaccine passports can help us get back to our lives. But we need to make sure they don't hurt us especially our most vulnerable in the process.

The Equigov Institute provides consultancy, training and research in data privacy/protection, governance, information access, transparency, and monitoring and evaluation.
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