Are they a path to reopening, or an ethical quandary?
 | By Max Strasser |
Here in London, we are finally, tentatively, eagerly easing out of some three months of lockdown. You're allowed to meet friends in the park these days. As of next week, you'll be allowed to have a drink with them in a pub garden. If all goes according to plan — a big if! — everything from sports stadiums to nightclubs will reopen in mid-June. But there's a caveat: Entering a London nightclub in 2021 may require more than just an ID; the British government is discussing instituting a system of "Covid passports." |
The plan under discussion would require people attending a "mass gathering" — a sports match, say, or a party at a club — to show on a smartphone app that they have been vaccinated, recently received a negative Covid-19 test, or recently recovered from the virus and so have antibodies. |
There aren't that many issues on which I genuinely cannot decide where I stand. I always like to hear both sides of an argument, and I'm willing to change my mind when new information or analysis persuade me. But the instances when a headline-grabbing issue leaves me vacillating on a daily basis? Those are rare. But that's the case with "vaccine passports." And it's not just being discussed here in Britain. The debate is just as fierce back in America, too, and in many other countries around the world. |
On its face, the idea may sound appealing: It could save theaters from extinction and return joy to the lives of countless football fanatics. It could help resuscitate our economies and allow people to enjoy activities that they've missed over the past year. But there are plenty of reasons to be skeptical: Aren't there legitimate privacy concerns about handing even more sensitive personal information over to the government or corporations? Perhaps more important, if vaccines aren't being distributed equitably, won't these vaccine passports just exacerbate inequalities? |
So, I'm on the fence, even if my colleagues in Opinion are doing a great job of providing more information on the issue: In the most recent edition of the Debatable newsletter, Spencer Bokat-Lindell helpfully runs through many of the arguments for and against immunity passports, from civil liberties to public health issues. (In fact, Spencer points out, "the public-health case for vaccine certification isn't rock solid.") And in today's episode of The Argument podcast, Jane Coaston talks to Natalie Kofler, a molecular biologist and bioethicist at Harvard Medical School, and Ramin Bastani, the founder and chief executive of Healthvana, a company that is supplying vaccine passports in the United States. |
After reading Spencer's newsletter and listening to Jane's podcast, I'm much better informed than I was yesterday, but I'm no closer to making up my mind. Then again, the truth is that these passports may be coming regardless of how I feel about them. |
Here's what we're focusing on today: |
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