Concept

Consideration of "Immunity Passport" Policy

Antibody testing is useful information in an epidemiological sense, but the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned against issuing “immunity passports,” also reffered to as “risk-free certificates” that would enable individuals to travel or to return to work. These documents are built on the assumption that individuals who have contracted the virus once are protected against re-infection. However, there is currently no evidence that people who have recovered from COVID-19 and have antibodies are protected from a second infection. The nation of Estonia has such a program in the works as of May as does the nation of Chile as of April, in spite of WHO's warnings. The president of the northeastern Veneto region of Italy, Luca Zaia, has agressively advocated for the introduction of "immunity passports", and the Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has taken the idea into consideration, though no concrete plans to introduce such measures have been introduced.

0

1

Updated 2020-07-27

Tags

SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19)

Biomedical Sciences