With vaccination rates rising worldwide, it is possible to imagine a world where the average individual may travel freely. Given the pain of COVID-19, many people — and the governments — are still concerned about the appropriate approach to proceed with the gradual reopening of previously closed organizations and borders.
Canada is not exempt from the debate. The concept of vaccine passports, sometimes known as resistance passports, is generating a lot of buzz in the town. These terms refer to paper or electronic papers that demonstrate a person has received a COVID-19 immunization.
According to recent research by Leger360, a large majority of Canadians (61 percent) support their government requiring proof of vaccination as a condition of attending public events. A significantly larger majority, 64%, would approve obtaining a vaccine passport if you have to engage in a gathering. Furthermore, 79 percent of respondents favour mandating vaccine passports for Canadians going between regions or to or from foreign countries, and 82 percent favour asking non-Canadians entering Canada to provide confirmation of their immigration status.
Non-Canadians also wish to visit Canada. The authorities in America are ready to open the border between the United States and Canada. This move, of course, needs both countries’ consent. On the other hand, Americans are significantly less enthusiastic about the idea of vaccine passports, according to the same poll. Several states in the country have outlawed its use.
Vaccines appear to be highly successful thus far, and it appears that in most nations, the question is not if anybody who wants a vaccine will get one, but when they will get one. Whether internal or international, border closures have proven disastrous for so many individuals in so many ways. Proving something one already accomplished appears to be a little price to pay in exchange for the right to travel to other nations or welcome foreign visitors to one’s own. Vaccine passports may persuade people to get immunized who would not otherwise. There have been precedents in the past. Even now, some countries demand confirmation of inoculation against specific diseases.
However, there are drawbacks.
There are real privacy concerns. A vaccine passport reveals confidential info and may be used for purposes other than vaccination.
People try to falsify passports, and they sometimes manage to do it. How much more possible would this be with a new central database that is still in its infancy and lacks standardization if they can do it with a technology controlled by a central authority and honed over the years?
It is undeniable that rich countries produce and procure vaccines more quickly and efficiently than poorer nations. Will mandating vaccine passports penalize and exclude those who are already marginalized? What about persons who are eligible for the vaccine but refuse to obtain it for religious or other rationales?
The matter is still very much active and unresolved. It will be interesting to see how various governments, including Canada, deal with and resolve the problem.
