Are vaccine passports a necessity now?
Representational picture | Photo Credit: PTI  Key Highlights Covaxin and Sputnik V do not feature on the emergency use listing of the World Health Organization Madhavan Menon, MD, Thomas Cook (India):We'll see vaccination becoming a requirement and vaccine records being digitised Subhash Goyal, Secretary General, FAITH: All vaccine passes will have to integrated internationally  Vaccine passport has become a much-debated and discussed topic among the public and leaders worldwide. A digital record indicating if you have been inoculated shall enable travel fulfilling the rules being put into place by various nations. The rollout of a vaccine passport faces certain obstacles. With some vaccines not making it to W.H.O's emergency use listing. While 3 vaccines are currently in use in India, Covaxin and Sputnik V do not feature on the emergency use listing (EUL) of the World Health Organization. The listing is significant as many countries are using it as a benchmark for overseas travel. Bharat Biotech and Russian manufacturers of Sputnik V have submitted an expression of interest papers to W.H.O for approval. Many countries across the world are now using the EUL as a benchmark for allowing vaccinated foreign nationals to travel. Therefore, those who have got the Covaxin shot are worried that they will have to be re-vaccinated in order to travel overseas. Talking to ET NOW, Madhavan Menon, MD, Thomas Cook (India) said, "We'll see vaccination becoming a requirement and vaccine records being digitised. The world has changed, and covid vaccines will become a denominator. The quicker we get our people vaccinated, the quicker we'll be able to travel." Although the government has said that vaccine certificates from CoWIN will now be linked to passports for people planning international travel for education, work opportunities or as part of the Indian contingent for the Tokyo Olympics. India had last week expressed concern & strong opposition to Vaccine Passport at this juncture of the pandemic, At the G7 health ministers meet, Union health minister Dr Harsh Vardhan had cited low vaccine coverage in developing countries compared to developed ones and said that initiative like vaccine passports could prove to be highly discriminatory. Israel became the first country to introduce Vaccine Passport in May and the European Union is expected to soon follow suit. According to Subhash Goyal, Secretary-General, FAITH, "Be it the EU pass or a pan-African pass, all these passes will have to integrate internationally. At least those who have received both the doses and if they have tested negative, they should be allowed to travel that is something which can be done immediately." Mr Madhavan Menon says, "If you are going to have a uniform vaccine passport different government have got to up their game in the way they deal with these documents and get it digitized...What worries me is the talk over vaccine passport, which vaccine is acceptable, which is not could become an issue. And it can be discriminatory."