The Utility, Feasibility, Security, and Ethics of Verifiable COVID-19 Credentials for International Travel Proceedings of a Workshop—in Brief (2021) / Chapter Skim
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The Utility, Feasibility, Security, and Ethics of Verifiable COVID-19 Credentials for International Travel: Proceedings of a Workshop - in Brief
The Utility, Feasibility, Security, and Ethics of Verifiable COVID-19 Credentials for International Travel: Proceedings of a Workshop - in Brief
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This Proceedings of a Workshop -- in Brief provides a high-level summary of the discussion on possibilities for employing COVID-19 travel credentials, including how to overcome practical and ethical challenges and their potential role in preventing the spread of disease. PUBLIC HEALTH AND EPIDEMIOLOGY Public Health Impacts of International Travel Kathleen Neuzil, University of Maryland School of Medicine, discussed the public health impact of requiring vaccination or testing for travel.
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She noted that symptom self-reporting can be difficult due to the wide range of potential symptoms, including none, and temperature screening can be ineffective, given that transmission can occur before symptoms, some people never get a fever, and fever inhibitor medications may mask fever. Rasmussen noted that despite a decrease in vaccine efficacy to the Delta variant, recent studies suggest no indication that vaccinated people with breakthrough infections of Delta are responsible for much onward transmission, particularly to other vaccinated people,6 and breakthrough infections in vaccinated people are "cleared" much faster than in the unvaccinated.7 She emphasized that to reopen international travel, at this stage, it is best to prioritize populations who have not received vaccines versus providing boosters to those already vaccinated, and vaccination efforts should be combined with mitigating nonpharmaceutical interventions to reduce transmission in highly vaccinated countries.
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. For example, the EU system, the Digital Green Certificate, shares public keys so that another country may check that the certificate is valid.
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Another approach involves strategically engaging business, civil society, and government bodies to galvanize support for vaccine credentials, such as using a "pledge" and "badge" system in certain industries, such as the Safe Travels or Trusted Traveler programs. Discussion of Epidemiology, Public Health, and Policy Saskia Popescu, George Mason University, began the discussion by asking the speakers about the role of travel restrictions in dealing with different variants.
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It is also part of a larger, more than 120 organization effort called the Good Health Pass Collaborative (GHPC) , a multisector global initiative designed to establish principles, standards, and a governance framework for digital health passes for international travel.16 GHPC developed an interoperability blueprint, which articulates recommendations for a globally interoperable digital pass and trust ecosystem.
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The Excelsior Pass links to a database that includes every person who has been vaccinated or tested in New York State and allows each individual to access their personal health record. The day of the workshop coincided with the soft launch of the Excelsior Pass Plus, which mirrors the information on the CDC card; it can also be used to travel to international destinations, including France, Greece, Italy, Spain, and any other location where VeriFLY partners are located.
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NOTE: CDC = U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; EU = European Union; IATA = International Air Transport Association; ICAO = International Civil Aviation Organization; PKI = public key infrastructure.
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Some of the remaining issues include streamlining and consistency across member states; concerns related to fraud and security; and the question of longer-term facilitation of the transfer of health information. Discussion of Privacy and Legal Considerations Lawrence Gostin, Georgetown University, moderated the discussion and began by asking speakers if they envision this as an area for international law to provide a solution for the inconsistencies between requirements in different locations and different platforms.
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She stated that citizens of the Global South already face additional barriers to international travel, and vaccine inequity is an unprecedented ethical challenge of global distribution and production that must be solved at the global level. She argued that pressure must be applied to national governments to pursue vaccine equity.
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, outlined some UNWTO data on economic losses incurred since January 2020, including a 73 percent reduction in international tourist arrivals, a $1.1 trillion loss in export revenues from international tourism, and 100 million direct tourism jobs at risk.32 She said that the UNTWO panel of experts expects a return to normal travel in 3–4 years, and the difficulty is largely due to travel restrictions. Many countries are maintaining a policy of complete or partial border closures, with the most severe travel restrictions in countries in Asia and the Pacific.
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reserve entry restrictions for only the highest-risk countries, (2) replace all other blanket travel restrictions with a framework of risk-based entry protocols (country-level risk assessment, implement entry protocols based on individual risk profile)
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, Brian Anderson, Ezekiel Emanuel, Lawrence Gostin, Margaret A Hamburg, Kathleen Neuzil, Mark Pearson, Megan Walklet-Tighe, and Abbey Wojno.
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