TwelveAngryMen
Well-known member
The NHS app will be converted into a digital Covid-19 certificate allowing people to use their phone to prove that they have been vaccinated or tested negative.
No 10 is considering allowing businesses to demand to see the app to ensure that staff or customers are at a much lower risking of being infectious.
Michael Gove will lead a review into the “deep and complex” issues around vaccine passports, which the government is considering again after previously branding them discriminatory.
It is understood that the government wants to give people the option of showing either vaccination status or test results to ensure that the scheme not does penalise those who cannot receive the vaccine for health reasons.
Health chiefs are looking at using the existing NHS app to offer an easy way for people to show that they have been vaccinated or recently tested. While the NHS contact tracing app is considered unsuitable because its design favours privacy, officials believe that the standard NHS appointment booking app would be relatively straightforward to use.
The app already allows people to see their medical records — including Covid-19 vaccinations — and test results are shared with the GP databases it uses, making it feasible to upload and access them quickly.
Health bosses say it is a “mix of ethical and clinical questions” that the review needs to answer, rather than technical ones. This could include whether people could input and verify the results of a lateral flow test carried out at home.
The government is also considering broader questions about whether people could be denied jobs if they could not prove their Covid-19 status, or refused entry to theatres, pubs or other public places.
Boris Johnson said yesterday that “the fervent libertarians will reject [the app] but other people will think there’s a case for it”, insisting that Gove would be “getting the best scientific, moral, philosophical and ethical viewpoints on it and will work out a way forward”.
The review will report before the June 21 date pencilled in for a full reopening of the economy and Johnson said yesterday: “There are deep and complex issues that we need to explore, and ethical issues about what the role is for government in mandating or for people to have such a thing, or indeed in banning people doing such a thing. We can’t be discriminatory against people who for whatever reason can’t have the vaccine.”
However, No 10 believes that including test results would get round this problem and requiring a recent negative result would be another way of showing that someone is at much lower risk of passing on the virus if allowed to attend a festival or other crowded place. Neither that nor vaccination is regarded as 100 per cent proof that someone cannot be infectious.
In November the head of Test and Trace, Baroness Harding of Winscombe, said that she was “working very closely with the vaccine team to make sure that as we build tools that will enable people to be testing themselves at home . . . we build an integrated data architecture so that you have the opportunity in the future to be able to have a single record as a citizen of your test results and whether you’ve been vaccinated”.
The NHS app uses facial verification technology developed by iProov, a company that was given a £75,000 grant by the arms-length government agency InnovateUK to look into vaccine passports.
Speaking to The Times before the government’s review of Covid-19 status certification was announced, Andrew Bud, iProov’s chief executive, said that the department of health and social care had a “pivotal role” to play in deciding whether it was willing to allow its existing databases to be used to develop vaccine certificates.
He said that the existing vaccination data displayed on an individual’s profile in the app was not sufficient to amount to a secure certificate, however. “The idea that you can just hold up your NHS app and go ‘that’s my certificate’ is wrong,” Bud said, because it would be hard for individual companies to verify that somebody was presenting their own certificate rather than, for example, a screenshot of a vaccinated friend’s.
An extra layer of verification afterwards, proving that the individual has indeed been vaccinated, would be needed.
Health
NHS
CORONAVIRUS
February 23 2021, 9.00am
Henry Zeffman | Chris Smyth, Whitehall Editor
CORONAVIRUS
February 20 2021, 12.01am
Kat Lay, Health Editor
CORONAVIRUS
February 19 2021, 12.00pm
Steven Swinford, Political Editor | Henry Zeffman, Chief Political Correspondent | Ben Clatworthy, Assistant Travel Editor | George Grylls | Anthee Carassava
Share
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/nhs-app-to-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?te...-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sha...-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/nhs-app-to-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
Save
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/nhs-app-to-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
NEXT ARTICLE
Salmond appearance at inquiry in doubt after evidence ruling
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/...ood-inquiry-after-evidence-censored-lddj8r3m6
No 10 is considering allowing businesses to demand to see the app to ensure that staff or customers are at a much lower risking of being infectious.
Michael Gove will lead a review into the “deep and complex” issues around vaccine passports, which the government is considering again after previously branding them discriminatory.
It is understood that the government wants to give people the option of showing either vaccination status or test results to ensure that the scheme not does penalise those who cannot receive the vaccine for health reasons.
Health chiefs are looking at using the existing NHS app to offer an easy way for people to show that they have been vaccinated or recently tested. While the NHS contact tracing app is considered unsuitable because its design favours privacy, officials believe that the standard NHS appointment booking app would be relatively straightforward to use.
The app already allows people to see their medical records — including Covid-19 vaccinations — and test results are shared with the GP databases it uses, making it feasible to upload and access them quickly.
Health bosses say it is a “mix of ethical and clinical questions” that the review needs to answer, rather than technical ones. This could include whether people could input and verify the results of a lateral flow test carried out at home.
The government is also considering broader questions about whether people could be denied jobs if they could not prove their Covid-19 status, or refused entry to theatres, pubs or other public places.
Boris Johnson said yesterday that “the fervent libertarians will reject [the app] but other people will think there’s a case for it”, insisting that Gove would be “getting the best scientific, moral, philosophical and ethical viewpoints on it and will work out a way forward”.
The review will report before the June 21 date pencilled in for a full reopening of the economy and Johnson said yesterday: “There are deep and complex issues that we need to explore, and ethical issues about what the role is for government in mandating or for people to have such a thing, or indeed in banning people doing such a thing. We can’t be discriminatory against people who for whatever reason can’t have the vaccine.”
However, No 10 believes that including test results would get round this problem and requiring a recent negative result would be another way of showing that someone is at much lower risk of passing on the virus if allowed to attend a festival or other crowded place. Neither that nor vaccination is regarded as 100 per cent proof that someone cannot be infectious.
In November the head of Test and Trace, Baroness Harding of Winscombe, said that she was “working very closely with the vaccine team to make sure that as we build tools that will enable people to be testing themselves at home . . . we build an integrated data architecture so that you have the opportunity in the future to be able to have a single record as a citizen of your test results and whether you’ve been vaccinated”.
The NHS app uses facial verification technology developed by iProov, a company that was given a £75,000 grant by the arms-length government agency InnovateUK to look into vaccine passports.
Speaking to The Times before the government’s review of Covid-19 status certification was announced, Andrew Bud, iProov’s chief executive, said that the department of health and social care had a “pivotal role” to play in deciding whether it was willing to allow its existing databases to be used to develop vaccine certificates.
He said that the existing vaccination data displayed on an individual’s profile in the app was not sufficient to amount to a secure certificate, however. “The idea that you can just hold up your NHS app and go ‘that’s my certificate’ is wrong,” Bud said, because it would be hard for individual companies to verify that somebody was presenting their own certificate rather than, for example, a screenshot of a vaccinated friend’s.
An extra layer of verification afterwards, proving that the individual has indeed been vaccinated, would be needed.
Health
NHS
Related articles
CORONAVIRUS
‘Covid certificates’ could unlock mass events
People could be asked to show a vaccine passport in order to attend a big event or go to work under plans being considered by the government. The...February 23 2021, 9.00am
Henry Zeffman | Chris Smyth, Whitehall Editor
CORONAVIRUS
Scientists list tough criteria to approve passports
Vaccine passports are “feasible” but there are significant hurdles that must be overcome before their widespread use, leading scientists have...February 20 2021, 12.01am
Kat Lay, Health Editor
CORONAVIRUS
Hope for British holidays by Easter
Self-catered holidays could be allowed at Easter, the Welsh first minister has said, amid growing optimism that some hospitality businesses will...February 19 2021, 12.00pm
Steven Swinford, Political Editor | Henry Zeffman, Chief Political Correspondent | Ben Clatworthy, Assistant Travel Editor | George Grylls | Anthee Carassava
Share
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/nhs-app-to-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?te...-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sha...-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/nhs-app-to-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
Save
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/nhs-app-to-be-converted-for-vaccine-passports-r0xx0mflp
NEXT ARTICLE
Salmond appearance at inquiry in doubt after evidence ruling
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/...ood-inquiry-after-evidence-censored-lddj8r3m6