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I’ve had my Covid-19 shots. Now where’s my vaccine passport?
- The longer the pandemic recession continues, the more catastrophic for economies worldwide. Hence the urgency of restoring safe travel and getting a proper grip on the risks that face us
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David Dodwell is CEO of the trade policy and international relations consultancy Strategic Access.
I have a sore right shoulder, and a BioNTech vaccine certificate in my pocket. I have dug my passport out from the back of my bedside drawer and dusted it down. I am ready to join that small elite body of pioneers keen to venture into the unknown. As Star Trekkers would say, ready to go where no man has gone before.
But obstacles remain between me and this long-lost right to travel: bureaucrats worldwide, their reluctance to agree terms for resuming safe and trusted travel, and a positively primitive refusal to get a proper grip on risk.
I want my vaccine passport now, and am confident that this, in combination with appropriate testing, vigilance in wearing masks, and common sense on social distancing, will keep me safe, and ensure I don’t constitute a threat to anyone else.
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Perhaps the persistence of paranoia is understandable in view of so many grim and heartbreaking images emerging daily from India, and the stumbling delays in delivering vaccines to so many poorer parts of the world.
But there must surely by now be international recognition that a combination of the knowledge we have about the Covid-19 virus, and a reasonably rigorous assessment of the day-by-day risks our communities face, lay a trustworthy foundation for restoring safe travel.
The risk-ignorant paranoia of our Hong Kong administration feels incomprehensible. With 286 people dying in Hong Kong every week from cancer, 178 a week from pneumonia, and 117 a week from heart disease, the draconian discrimination over the risk of a virus that has killed 210 people over 16 months seems hard to fathom.
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