The World Health Organization will use the European Union's digital Covid certificate to launch a global digital certification scheme, thanks to a "historic" partnership signed on Monday.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and European Commissioner for Health Stella Kyriakides signed the "historic initiative to strengthen global health security" in Geneva.
Better prepare for future pandemics
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The Covid-19 pandemic has shown the importance of digital health solutions to facilitate access to health services," said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus at the signing ceremony. He explained that the European pass would be transformed into a "global public good". This future global digital certification system must, according to a statement from the WHO and the European Commission, "contribute to facilitating mobility and protecting citizens around the world from current and future health threats, including pandemics".
It is the first component of WHO's global digital health certification network, which is to develop "a wide range of digital products to improve health for all", such as digital international immunization records.
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This network "will be an important part of our efforts to strengthen health systems and help our Member States better prepare for the next epidemic or pandemic," said Dr Tedros. "The network could also play a crucial role in cross-border humanitarian situations by ensuring people's access to their medical records when crossing borders due to conflict, climate crisis or other emergencies," he observed.
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The EU health pass is already the most widespread in the world. "With 80 countries and territories connected to the EU Covid-19 digital certificate, the EU has set a global standard. The European certificate has not only been an important tool in our fight against the pandemic, but it has also facilitated international travel and tourism," said European Commissioner Thierry Breton, who is in charge of digital affairs.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus stressed that the future global digital certification system would be "based on the principles of fairness, innovation, transparency and data protection and privacy". WHO will not have access to personal data, to which only the authorities will have access. "Privacy is key," Tedros argued, but WHO will be able to verify the authenticity of certificates.
