In April, the World Health Organization (WHO) will hold a meeting of the technical working group that is developing the proposals for a digital certificate of vaccination against COVID-19.
Since the beginning of the vaccination campaigns against COVID-19, in December 2020, the WHO has begun to develop strategies with governments and private companies to develop an “immunization passport”.
One of the first actions of the WHO was the creation of the Smart Vaccination Certificate Working Group to late 2020. The intention of this group was to create an intelligent version of the Letter Jaune o Yellow Card, a document used for decades in physical format to verify vaccination against yellow fever.
InThe Chronic Disease Information System has been implemented in March 2021, the WHO published the first provisional guide for the elaboration of a smart vaccination certificate, and they defined this term as "a medical document that records a vaccination service that a person has received".
Later in april 2021, WHO held the seventh meeting of the Emergency Committee of the International Health Regulations (IHR), in which the issue of digital documentation for vaccination certificates against COVID-19 was brought up again. However, the Smart Vaccination Certificate Working Group was dissolved by the WHO just four months after its creation.
However, to end of august, the WHO published a document with the ethical considerations and recommendations for the implementation of vaccination certificates against COVID-19 in the member states.
In this document, the WHO ratified its position against vaccination certificates being a requirement for travel. However, he recognized the need for countries to assess the risks of receiving foreign visitors.
In this way, the WHO defined the principles that the implementations of the digital documentation of COVID-19 certificates must comply with, such as the protection and promotion of the well-being of users, equality, and trust in public health activities. Regarding technology, the document reaffirmed the importance of transparency, inclusiveness in decision-making, accountability and responsiveness.
This year, the WHO will hold a meeting of the technical working group in early April to propose interoperability solutions in vaccination certificates so that they are internationally recognized.
In various countries, digital solutions have been adopted for vaccination certification, such as the European Union model, India, or Australia. Even in the United States, digital certificates have been applied by private initiatives.
