Paris (AFP)
Health passports to boost international travel despite the persistent Covid-19 pandemic?
Several countries believe in it, such as China which is launching one this week, the major airlines are working on it, but the concept covers several different, even competing projects.
- What are we talking about ?
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The health passport is a document that proves that its holder is, a priori, immune to Covid-19 and can therefore travel from one country to another without risking transmitting the virus across borders.
We often speak of a "vaccine" passport because it is the fact of having received a vaccine that most clearly points to this immunity.
But the various projects in progress, which generally take the form of a smartphone application, accept other criteria: for example a test guaranteeing the presence of antibodies in the traveler in the idea that he has already been reached. by illness in the past.
We must distinguish these passports from another concept, for example that described as a "health pass" by Emmanuel Macron, the French president.
The latter does not have the same purpose because it would only be valid in his country of origin.
It aims to reserve the entrance to certain businesses, such as restaurants, or certain events, such as concerts, to people who are immune.
- Who's working on it?
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Many countries are considering the implementation of a health passport and some have already launched it.
At the forefront, China this week announced such a digital "health certificate" for Chinese people who would like to travel abroad.
In Europe, Greece and Cyprus have implemented passports of this type to Israel, a country particularly advanced in its vaccination, in agreement with the Jewish state: vaccinated citizens can travel between these countries without restrictions.
In isolation, other European countries, such as Denmark and Sweden, plan to launch health passports soon.
But it is much more complicated at the level of the entire European Union (EU), faced with the reluctance of Germany and France.
However, the EU has promised to present a draft "green passport" in mid-March to facilitate travel within it.
- Is this a real passport?
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No, no project yet resembles the equivalent of a real passport, that is to say a document required to travel from one country to another.
For example, the Chinese health passport is only one option for nationals of this country, with the idea of giving them more "conveniences".
But, in the absence of agreements for the time being with other countries, the interest remains unclear.
Ultimately, it is less a new official document than an application intended to facilitate health checks when crossing a border.
This is why the private sector has also seized on the idea, first of all the big airlines which are seething to see an activity ravaged by travel restrictions resume.
The International Air Transport Association (Iata), which brings together most of the global sector, has been working for several months on a digital passport allowing passengers to prove their health status before boarding.
Isolated companies, like American Airlines, are already doing this.
- Can we go further?
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Systematize these health passports and make them more binding?
This poses legal problems which explain in particular the timidity of France.
They are twofold.
First, by making vaccination compulsory for certain trips, they would create inequality between citizens, while access to anti-Covid vaccines is still very limited in most countries.
Finally, privacy advocates are also concerned about the way, which remains largely imprecise, in which these applications would access personal health data.
In France, for example, there is an official database of people who have already received an anti-Covid vaccine.
The digital regulatory authority, the Cnil, accepts its existence, but it has warned: if it is to use it for a passport, it will re-examine the subject very closely.
© 2021 AFP