Politics

The Guardian view on immunity passports: an idea whose time has not come | Editorial


If ministers think immunity passports or wristbands are the answer to resolving the immediate coronavirus crisis, they are asking the wrong question. Such a system, if implemented, would see one group of people granted the right to retrieve the civil liberties they had lost in the lockdown, and another group hanging around at home while they waited to contract a virus that can kill those it infects.

This does not mean that serological testing (for antibodies) is unimportant. It will be vital to get a sense of how far the infection has spread, to gauge how many of us had Covid-19. The science is not clearcut. Those who had coronavirus may not have known it – or they may have been painfully aware of its murderous potential. While people with antibodies are believed to have protection from reinfection, no one is sure how long that protection will last. A passport may give people a sense of false security about the disease.

If an antibody test that works could be found, then key parts of the labour force – such as doctors and nurses – could return to work. However, antibody testing needs to be carefully validated. There is a worry that some of the early Chinese tests proved defective. Speed is important. This week, US authorities granted the first emergency-use authorisation for an antibody test.

The viral spread of Covid-19 is too fast to be contained by manual contact tracing. Hence the need for a lockdown. Digital contact tracing via a smartphone app appears a better way to get back to normal life now than an immunity passport. In this system, a person registers their symptoms or positive test results. Using the phone’s GPS and bluetooth technology, the app then builds a memory of who is nearby and immediately notifies contacts of positive cases. Other nations, which started earlier, have shown that with such technology epidemics can be contained without the need for mass quarantines.

The spread of mass surveillance is not to be welcomed but, for a temporary period in this public health crisis, it seems necessary. People should be entitled to decide whether to adopt this platform. Ministers will get buy-in if they explain clearly that the intention is not to impose the technology as a permanent change to society, but to save lives and protect the NHS. There should be legal limitations on the purposes for which this sensitive personal data can be used and who will have access to it. There must be transparency over how and where information will be stored and for how long.

Much of the surveillance infrastructure has already been deployed. But the decisions to self-isolate must be, in most cases, down to the individual. The UK ought not to end up in a place where people who can responsibly leave their homes are barred from entering a supermarket because their smartphones are being allowed to share their Covid-19 history and location with private companies.



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