Vaccine passports: path back to normality or problem in the making?

[scorecard]

55 minutes ago, FarFlungFalang said:

I think I each country is willing to accept the passports we have they will accept each counties vaccine certificates in the best interest of humanity's health after all our governments will say it's for your own protection! 

Agreed.

 

But to be honest I'm less then impressed with the World Health Organization on many aspects of the whole Covid 19 issue, and now it seems they have done very little to plan/implement a globally accepted Vaccine Certificate. 

[billd766]

1 hour ago, FarFlungFalang said:

Do you have a yellow book? Do you go to your local hospital? I went recently for a rabies jab after being bitten by a cat and they also threw in a Diphtheria booster and now I'm on the data system so I think you will also be able to do the same for the vaccine though you might have to prove you have some friends so you might need to work on that.

Yes I have a yellow book and I am registered at the "local" hospital 15 km away.

 

As for friends I live in rural Kamphaeng Phet and there are 2 farangs around the main village, 1 Belgian who speaks less English than I do Thai. There are 3 more some 20 odd km away, 1 English, 1 Aussie and 1 German/Aussie.

 

There are some more farangs but they live from 35 to 80 km away. We meet for lunch about once a month or 6 weeks.

[FarFlungFalang]

14 minutes ago, billd766 said:

Yes I have a yellow book and I am registered at the "local" hospital 15 km away.

 

As for friends I live in rural Kamphaeng Phet and there are 2 farangs around the main village, 1 Belgian who speaks less English than I do Thai. There are 3 more some 20 odd km away, 1 English, 1 Aussie and 1 German/Aussie.

 

There are some more farangs but they live from 35 to 80 km away. We meet for lunch about once a month or 6 weeks.

It seems like you have a lot more friends than I do, and I'm lucky to see more than 2 falangs a year.

[placnx]

On 2/6/2021 at 1:03 PM, 4MyEgo said:

 

We are all destined to pass in this life, fact !

 

I remember what my father said to me once, i.e. he saw that I was stressed over something and said son; I have been where your coming from, think about it for a minute, you are allowing all of those thought in your mind to run around and stress you, while you have absolutely no control over them, so accept that, you have no control.

 

When you realise that you have no control, you can then take control of what you could not control and only then can you enjoy your life, it's simple, fear and panic only causes you to stress, and it is part of our society and will be around for as long as you allow it to control you.

 

Do I still stress, only when I get on TVF ????

 

 

 

Great points you make about stress, and how reading TV could be stressful.

 

I am not frightened for personal safety or mortality, but rather for the ability of this deadly virus this to rapidly gather a dozen or so mutations in one variant that then can reduce the efficacy of vaccines. The South African variant is reducing the efficacy of some vaccines to the point that several producers are working on boosters. If vaccinated people end up getting a little sick rather than being hospitalized, that's good but it might do little to keep them from passing the infection to others.

 

Booster after booster is really not the ultimate solution with a virus that can circulate so rapidly. It's just not a practical solution to be giving the whole world a jab every year or so. It will not be an optional vaccination as is the case for flu vaccine. The problem is that we don't seem to have enough production capacity for the mRNA vaccines to be able to get them around the world quickly enough to keep ahead of current and future variants. We want to get to the point where contact tracing of outbreaks is an option.

[placnx]

On 2/6/2021 at 1:56 PM, Morch said:

 

And bio-metric documents (passports and the like) can't be forged or tampered with. Sure.

The QR code on paper being linked to a specific individual would be of no benefit to a forger.

[placnx]

23 hours ago, ukrules said:

 

Yes, that's a pretty simple system and I'm sure it worked well for the tiny numbers of people who needed it.

 

Now scale it up to everyone who travels anywhere in the world at all times.

 

Add in a few hundred million people who won't take any kind of vaccination because they're 'antivaxers' and then there's the people who have allergies to vaccines (millions more).

 

How do you address vaccines which have efficiency levels of say 55% compared to the vaccines that have an efficiency level of 95%?

 

Does everyone get treated the same? Highly unlikely.

 

The countries will pick and choose who they allow in and it will be based on which vaccine they've had, that's where it starts to get complicated, very complicated.

 

In theory it's a good idea but in practice there's no way it will work properly.

 

That's why we need not just a QR card but a system of databases to hold vaccination records but also keep up to date information of all the vaccines. I think that we should also see if the manufacturers would use blockchain to document the distribution of vaccines to the level of clinics to lessen the possibility of swapping or faking vaccines.

 

As for people who have valid issues and are unable to be vaccinated, ideally they should be required to provide substantial proof, so a hospital where they receive treatment could document that on the vaccination record. What happens when they arrive at an airport depends on the airline and immigration. They would probably have to undergo antigen testing pre-flight and maybe quarantine, maybe RT-PCR or antibody tests on arrival.

[Morch]

10 minutes ago, placnx said:

The QR code on paper being linked to a specific individual would be of no benefit to a forger.

 

And how is it linked to that person? How are the details stored? Everything can (eventually) be hacked and faked.

[placnx]

18 hours ago, BangkokReady said:

Have a DL style card in the short term, then as passports are replaced over time, make it a requirement to have a covid vaccination page (or just general "vaccination page", but we know what it will be for) after the biodata page linked to a database.

 

No one gets in without vaccine, but still need quarantine until numbers in the target country are high enough that the chance of people getting very sick or dying is minimal.

 

Once each country gets to the point where enough people are vaccinated, and getting a yearly(ish) booster, they can do away with the quarantine.

 

Sadly, covid looks to be here to stay.  Who knows, maybe they will eradicate it if the vaccine makes people less likely to catch it and to spread it.  At this point, I think most people would settle for just being able to travel as normal.

The code of the QR card could also be printed in the passport or on a sticker as done for visas.

[placnx]

12 hours ago, ukrules said:

 

Without cryptographic signatures linked back to some central issuing authority in each country these could be faked by the millions in days.

 

Quite right. This is an interim solution. Let's hope that their databases are not chaotic. 

[placnx]

7 hours ago, scorecard said:

Who knows, but adding it to MEDICARE on-line records is both logical and practical.

 

Medicare started maybe 4 decades ago in Australia, it's a pretty good system and it's popular, free, covers all conditions (but not cosmetic stuff) and all Australian citizens are fully entitled and totally easy to get started, most parents enrol their kids just after birth. Permanent Residents also fully entitled also many other visa holders . There's currently discussion about extending full benefits to international students and some categories of folks on working visas (e.g. fruit/agricultural workers). 

Each country has a different system. These personal health records should be linked to the national vaccination database in each country so that medical records can be updated with vaccinations, even if they happen in another country. It's not sensible to fragment public health records such as vaccinations by recording them directly in personal health files.

[placnx]

5 hours ago, billd766 said:

That is fine, but what about expats worldwide who hold passports from one country and are living full time in another such as Thailand. We wouldn't be on the home country medical data base nor most probably on the host country medical data base.

 

I am asking for myself as I don't have many friends.   ????

So if someone receives their first Covid vaccination in Thailand, their QR card would have the Thai preface code and they would be in the Thai database. That does not preclude NHS (for example) interfacing with this database to update personal medical records. There would be an online procedure for the card holder to give NHS their QR code.

[placnx]

4 hours ago, scorecard said:

Agreed.

 

But to be honest I'm less then impressed with the World Health Organization on many aspects of the whole Covid 19 issue, and now it seems they have done very little to plan/implement a globally accepted Vaccine Certificate. 

It's reported that Estonia is working on an updated certificate for WHO.

[placnx]

19 minutes ago, Morch said:

 

And how is it linked to that person? How are the details stored? Everything can (eventually) be hacked and faked.

The issue could be some country hacking the national databases of another country. Actually, they might be even more interested in hacking the vaccine database to downgrade a competitor. That might be a single database in the cloud, so a lot of attention to security would be needed.

[scorecard]

16 minutes ago, placnx said:

It's reported that Estonia is working on an updated certificate for WHO.

Australia also making progress but at this stage for domestic use and perhaps accepted abroad. 

 

11 minutes ago, placnx said:

The issue could be some country hacking the national databases of another country. Actually, they might be even more interested in hacking the vaccine database to downgrade a competitor. That might be a single database in the cloud, so a lot of attention to security would be needed.

A globally accepted vaccine certificate is critical and must be set up so each persons vaccine status can be honestly/quickly verified. That will be complex but it must be done. 

[BEVUP]

7 hours ago, scorecard said:

Who knows, but adding it to MEDICARE on-line records is both logical and practical.

 

Medicare started maybe 4 decades ago in Australia, it's a pretty good system and it's popular, free, covers all conditions (but not cosmetic stuff) and all Australian citizens are fully entitled and totally easy to get started, most parents enrol their kids just after birth. Permanent Residents also fully entitled also many other visa holders . There's currently discussion about extending full benefits to international students and some categories of folks on working visas (e.g. fruit/agricultural workers). 

You obviously don't work

Not free for workers as they are charged 2% (av) on top of their personal tax

[BEVUP]

30 minutes ago, placnx said:

Each country has a different system. These personal health records should be linked to the national vaccination database in each country so that medical records can be updated with vaccinations, even if they happen in another country. It's not sensible to fragment public health records such as vaccinations by recording them directly in personal health files.

I disagree with this especially in Auss

Employers have a policy of discriminating against individuals due to their insurance companies

I,ve known people who had medical problems & all fixed up IE pace maker / liver op told they would not be employed unless passed by Specialist which they already had 

 

[BEVUP]

5 hours ago, FarFlungFalang said:

I think I each country is willing to accept the passports we have they will accept each counties vaccine certificates in the best interest of humanity's health after all our governments will say it's for your own protection! 

Just wait for some idiotic country like Auss to come along & say we will only except this type & from where

[BEVUP]

10 hours ago, FarFlungFalang said:

Now that the Australian federal government has implemented their digital vaccine passport they have not ruled out allowing state governments requiring people to be vaccinated to enter a supermarket, hospitals and public transport or any place they to choose.This could easily become a global requirement to force people to be vaccinated for anything in the future or to control any sought of public behaviour like the system now in place in China.So get ready people this is the next step now that you have given permission for governments to strip away any freedoms you think you might have had.It's a slippery slope we are on and it's too late to stop now.  

Agree

Their already a bunch of Capitalists 

Not know anything of the digital passport & don't have anything on the phone (never will )

 

[billd766]

5 hours ago, FarFlungFalang said:

It seems like you have a lot more friends than I do, and I'm lucky to see more than 2 falangs a year.

To meet the ones furthest away is about 80km each way and 1 1/2 hours drive each way.

 

We used to meet in KPP at a restaurant run by a German guy. The food was very good and we could drink, though if you were a smoker you were relegated to the car park. We haven't been there for months and I don't even know if he is still open any more. 

[billd766]

2 hours ago, placnx said:

So if someone receives their first Covid vaccination in Thailand, their QR card would have the Thai preface code and they would be in the Thai database. That does not preclude NHS (for example) interfacing with this database to update personal medical records. There would be an online procedure for the card holder to give NHS their QR code.

The problem I can see here is that it will require a huge worldwide database in some country with all the other countries linked to it. This may lead to hacking, changing of data, stealing of data, entering fake data and in the worst case, hackers could leave computer viruses which could infect the databases of so many countries.

[placnx]

18 hours ago, billd766 said:

The problem I can see here is that it will require a huge worldwide database in some country with all the other countries linked to it. This may lead to hacking, changing of data, stealing of data, entering fake data and in the worst case, hackers could leave computer viruses which could infect the databases of so many countries.

Somewhere back in these posts I explained that the vaccination records would be stored nationally, but the database for vaccines would most likely be unitary in the cloud. The Solar Wind hacking problems seen recently certainly are chilling, so a lot of attention would have to be placed on security. Auto updates to the vaccine database should be avoided.

[John Drake]

Why would any country accept the AZ vaccine for clearance, as it clearly doesn't work on the latest mutated form of Covid?

[billd766]

3 hours ago, John Drake said:

Why would any country accept the AZ vaccine for clearance, as it clearly doesn't work on the latest mutated form of Covid?

Try looking here. These are called links. Do you have any to back your post up?

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-55917793

 

A vaccine to tackle the coronavirus variants could be ready to deploy by the autumn should it be needed, the Oxford-AstraZeneca team says.

Prof Andy Pollard, from Oxford University, said tweaking a vaccine was a relatively quick process and would only need small trials before roll-out.

It comes as the UK announced more than 10 million people had received a jab.

There is still strong evidence existing vaccines work well against the mutations that have emerged.

Although their overall effectiveness may be weakened a little.

 

https://www.who.int/news-room/q-a-detail/coronavirus-disease-(covid-19)-vaccines?adgroupsurvey={adgroupsurvey}&gclid=Cj0KCQiA34OBBhCcARIsAG32uvPUeV-e6FSEB4SzKuJgf8LOtZt2P-5ogyM-r2IeOZik9akuQQCS7PcaAhkjEALw_wcB

 

 

[placnx]

5 hours ago, John Drake said:

Why would any country accept the AZ vaccine for clearance, as it clearly doesn't work on the latest mutated form of Covid?

They are already working on a revision to take account of the South African variant. I agree that the idea of a lot of people getting a little sick doesn't sound good. More infections means more chance for more variants.

[bangon04]

On 2/7/2021 at 1:11 AM, placeholder said:

But will it be internationally implemented? Have any other nations agreed to their standards?

Even if each country sets its own standards.... if you want to play the game you will have to follow the rules.....

[placnx]

1 minute ago, bangon04 said:

Even if each country sets its own standards.... if you want to play the game you will have to follow the rules.....

Each country can decide who can enter, but I hope that their informatics on vaccinations can interface. Otherwise it will be chaos at the airports.

[foreverlomsak]

On 2/4/2021 at 5:31 PM, snoop1130 said:

You need only match a face to a vaccination status, you don't need to know a person's identity, he added.

face recognition software I thought this was being outlawed in most western countries

[scorecard]

On 2/7/2021 at 9:08 PM, placnx said:

The issue could be some country hacking the national databases of another country. Actually, they might be even more interested in hacking the vaccine database to downgrade a competitor. That might be a single database in the cloud, so a lot of attention to security would be needed.

Sure, I suspect everybody would be strongly expecting that the databases/access to the databases has gold standard security.

 

Seems that the time is coming soon where impending international passengers will have to prove that they have had a complete Covid 19 vaccination. if the security is poor and can easily be manipulated* then it seems unscrupulous people could organize hackers or whoever to 'confirm' a passenger has had the vaccination when in fact they haven't.

This brings all sorts of dangerous scenarios.

(*My colleagues who are IT experts say there are plenty of hackers around who 'just love to hack anything' and plenty will accept payment for a specific 'hack'.) 

[GroveHillWanderer]

On 2/8/2021 at 9:35 PM, foreverlomsak said:

face recognition software I thought this was being outlawed in most western countries

I don't believe so. I've only heard of very limited moves to try and outlaw it in certain specific ways in one or two countries.

 

For instance, three cities in the US (San Francisco, Boston and Portland) have banned its use by law enforcement agencies and Canada told US company ClearView AI to remove pictures (of Canadian citizens only) from its database. ClearView has so far refused to do this, but did say that people could request their data be removed by using an opt-out form.

 

A bill has also been proposed in the US Congress, that seeks to outlaw face recognition software but it has not been passed yet.

 

I don't think that these limited efforts amount to it being banned "in most Western countries."

Edited February 11, 2021 by GroveHillWanderer

[scorecard]

On 2/9/2021 at 1:26 AM, placnx said:

Each country can decide who can enter, but I hope that their informatics on vaccinations can interface. Otherwise it will be chaos at the airports.

Therefore I wonder is passengers will have to submit something which can be checked at the time of making the booking. This would provide a time frame to get confirmation / contact passengers if there's some problem etc. 

 

If it's checked for every passenger at the time of check-in then yes possible chaos, arguments at check-in desks with some difficulties for passenger to get further information etc., flight delays, additional resources needed/reflected in ticket prices.