vanillabean

What happens when one day you're told you have a medical condition and a vaccination is needed or you'll die?

LGWClosedAgain

My example was a very low skill example, I expect most people who do not want to be vaccinated will find domestic solutions but my point remains for non westerns. Are we going to start turning people away from Africa/South America/Asia when they have an app that is completely unverifiable and we know vaccine deployment in their country is low?

Not to mention that at least with the biontech one, you get vial labeled with 5 doses that can have as much 6 or 7 doses.

747FC

Just got an email from my agent, offering to book me on a Crystal Cruise in July. Here is the verbiage re vaccination:

"**All guests will be required to be fully inoculated with a COVID-19 vaccine (both doses if recommended by manufacturer) at least 14 days prior to boarding any Crystal ship. Verified documentation of vaccination and negative COVID-19 test will be required at the time of boarding and failure to provide this documentation will result in denial of boarding. All documentation provided will need to be in English. Guests will be required to sign a form acknowledging these requirements before cruise tickets will be issued."

warakorn

Personally, I am all for vaccinating as many people as possible;
But we should acknowledge: a digital vaccine passport has only the benefit of convenience (not having to carry papers with you). However, a digital passport does not prevent fraud. A crook clinic today can issue you a fake yellow paper vaccination certificate. Tomorrow that crook clinic can put an entry into the vaccination database. No blockchain or whatever other technology bs will prevent that.

It'll be fun to watch guests turning up with real vaccine certificates, that they have received a Cinovac or Sputnik V shot. What will be cruise company do then? Anyhow, this is another construction site.

warakorn

Once the travel has been lifted, I doubt that a majority of EU countries will require a Covid 19 vaccination for foreigners entering their countries. Non-vaccinated people may face a testing regime, however, they won't be blanket refusal. So having a digital passport system or not should not hamper international travel.
Most EU country government do not think like their counterparts in Australia, New Zealand or Singapore.

exp

laughable that cruise companies would impose and strictly enforce vaccination requirements.

they may take anyone willing to pay for cruises for at least a couple of years because demand isn’t returning to 2019 levels too soon.

8420PR

On Wednesday this week, the EU published details of proposed digital immunity (or negative test) certificate: https://ec.europa.eu/info/live-work-...ertificates_en

I'm not sure if the flurry of posts saying such a thing won't work are linked to the announcement?

In any case, I believe standardization (of vaccine certificates or negative test results) across the EU will be a part of opening up travel this summer for EU citizens. A tiny amount of potential fraud doesn't change that, and will significantly reduce the potential fraud compared to today (with negative test results).

warakorn

When it comes to fraud with negative test results -> This mostly happens when people want to cross the EU external border into the EU.
An EU-wide standardization scheme won't help to alleviate that problem, because people, who want to enter the EU, cannot get tested in the EU beforehand. These people will still have to rely on the testing infrastructure in Kenya, India, Ukraine etc.

https://ec.europa.eu/info/live-work-...ertificates_en
This is just a BS answer.
Finland has closed it's border since March 2020 for non-Finnish EU citzens (with exceptions). It briefly reopened it in July.
Hungary has closed it's border since March 2020 for non-Finnish EU citzens (with exceptions). It briefly reopened it in July and August.
Any negative tests make no difference -> you cannot enter both countries.
So what's different with a "Digital Green Certificate"?

the810

The digital certificate is simply a common IT infrastructure that allows to make certificates more reliable than they are now. Right now, pretty much anyone can print their own certificate with no way to verify its authenticity. The digital system will be less prone to this, as only medical facilities will be able to issue digital certificates.

​​​​​​The proposal actually suggests that anyone who is either vaccinated or has a natural immunity will be able to travel into all member states. However, there is a provision for a member state to deny entry anyway if there is a valid reason to do it, so it's really no different from what we have today (right to travel to all member states that can be suspended on public health grounds).

WilcoRoger

What is interesting is that the EU says they won't accept proof of vaccination by non-EU approved vaccines (none of the Chinese ones have even applied for registration. Sputnik V's application is being processed), while China is reportedly will accept only Chinese vaccinations for visa purposes.

Tugh call to third country citizens - do you want to travel to China or Europe? (in the EU and US more or less the same vaccines are approved so far)

the810

The way I understand it, the digital pass is intended for EU citizens/residents, not for third country nationals.

warakorn

Well, this is just my opinion, but I think you didn't get my point or didn't want to read my posts.
In the EU alone (I assume) there will be 20,000+ medical facilities who are allowed to administer vaccines. And naturally, all of them need write-access to the vaccination database.
It is impossible to ensure that all of these facilities will be operating in a compliant manner. For EUR 100 they put you into the database as vaccinated, while selling of the non-administered vaccines via black channels to Moldova or Ukraine.

In many EU countries a patient has to bribe his doctor to get a good medical treatment to be prioritized. When hearing stories like that, you'll be experiencing mass corruption when it comes to digital vaccine certificates.

Moreover, there are media reports that certified laboratories in the EU are issuing questionable test results (e.g. they were provided with simple salt water and dog salliva; still they issued negative PCR test results). Those labs will also have write-access to a immunity passport database.

warakorn

Yes!
So that means that the current big problem that travellers from Ukraine, Moldova, Kenya, South Africa etc. are flying in with fake certificates, won't be solved at all with that digital pass.
Again, this new EU scheme is complete BS in my eyes.

WilcoRoger

You are correct - but lawyers would have a field day should EU citizens be placed in a worse position vs third country citizens. So it's quite probable that certificates (etc) of non approved vaccination for third country citizens would not be accepted any better than for EU citizens - at least until there's is globally approved (WHO) "pass"

This whole vacc pass thing is scary though, makes 1984 like liberty embodied... as we see already in China or S'pore

nope - external borders are not even discussed currently.

warakorn

Yes, what will happen in the end -> A EU country like Cyprus is deciding that for entry you need to vaccination certificate. Both a EU digital pass and a traditional yellow paper certificate will be accepted, incl. paper certificates from EU citizens.
So in the end there'll has to be a lot of manual checking being done. Essentially the digital pass is a "nice to have" feature. EU citizens are not required having it.

A globally approved WHO digital pass won't happen. So you don't need to pay EUR 100 to a Bulgarian clinic, but USD 20 to a Nigerian clinic for putting you into the vaccination database.
Fraud will be rampant with such a global system.

Well, why nope? My point is that if a digital pass is not covering external borders then the current big problems (crossing the external EU border) can never be solved.