COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) – The Danish government said on Wednesday it was joining forces with companies to develop a digital passport to show if people have been vaccinated against coronavirus, allowing them to travel and help ease life restrictions public.
Finance Minister Morten Boedskov said at a news conference that “in three, four months, a digital crown passport will be ready for use, for example, on business trips.”
“It is absolutely crucial for us to be able to restart Danish society so that companies can get back on track. Many Danish companies are global companies with the world as a market, ”he added.
As a first step, before the end of February, citizens of Denmark could see on a Danish health website the official confirmation of whether they have been vaccinated.
“It will be the additional passport you will be able to have on your mobile phone that documents that you have been vaccinated,” Boedskov said. “We can be one of the first in the world to have it and we can show it to the rest of the world.”
The coronavirus has experienced an almost total halt in international travel as countries try to contain the spread of the virus. Major European airlines, for example, want a tenth of their normal traffic.
The presentation by the Danish government was made together with representatives of the main business organizations, the Confederation of Danish Industries, which represents the leading companies in Denmark, and the Danish Chamber of Commerce.
Denmark, like neighboring Nordic and Baltic countries, has in recent years moved towards a fully digital system to reduce bureaucracy with online platforms that support electronic authentication and digital signature to enable both paperless communications. in both the private and public sectors.
The European Commission, meanwhile, has been weighing in on proposals to issue vaccination certificates to help travelers to their holiday destinations more quickly and prevent another disastrous summer for the European tourism sector. But the EU executive arm said that for now these certificates would only be used for medical purposes, for example to control the possible adverse effects of vaccines.
Some similar digital passports are being developed to help travelers safely demonstrate that they have met COVID-19 test requirements. One of them, called CommonPass, says it could also track vaccines.
On Tuesday, Estonia said it will allow passengers to arrive in the country with a COVID-19 vaccination test to avoid quarantine requirements.
The Baltic country said the certificate must meet certain criteria, including information indicating when the vaccine was given, which vaccine was used, the issuer of the vaccine and the batch number of vaccines. The certificate must be in Estonian, Russian or English.
The Danish government said it would later decide whether the digital passport should be used for purposes other than travel to help reopen public life.