Denmark to introduce Corona passport

The passport should not only be used for Danes traveling into the country after a trip abroad, but also for many other activities. Anyone who can present a vaccine pass must be allowed to go to restaurants, conferences, music festivals and sporting events, Danish daily Berlingske reported.

“It is about us as a country taking advantage of the technological advantages we have. We can be among the first in the world to have it and can show it to the rest of the world. We need to travel and move forward in society,” Morten Bødskov announced.

The decision to develop the passport has been made in consultation with Dansk Erhverv, the Danish business community. Their director, Lars Sandahl Sørensen, said that the passport “opens up many opportunities” and that it will be used for a long time to come.

“We will be able to use the Corona passport for many years to come,” he said during Wednesday’s press conference.

The government’s decision to introduce a Corona passport has met with criticism from several parties in the Danish Parliament, who believe that there are currently far too many unanswered questions about how the passport should work in practice. Whether these parties can or want to stop the plans is currently unclear. The government said in the coming months it would be able to give more information.

To date, 93 746 Danes have received both doses of the vaccine and are therefore considered fully vaccinated. In Sweden, the figure is only 28 279, according to Swedish outlet SVT.

Danish citizens are already able to download an official document if they have tested negative for the illness within the last seven days. The system will allow citizens to apply for a test through the country’s national health website. If it comes back negative, they are given one week to download the certificate.

On the country’s Swedish border, officials require Swedes coming into Denmark, to show proof of a negative test before being allowed to cross the border.

Michael Svane, chief executive of the Confederation of Danish Transport, told British daily The Independent: “It will certainly help Danes who have to travel with work or privately. We are in a time when, as a traveller, you encounter many obstacles. But the Covid-19 passport is easy to access and very easy to use.”

The World Health Organisation has cautioned against the use of immunity passports, because it is not yet known if contracting SARS-Cov-2 makes one immune to the virus. It may be quite possible to become contagious for a second time.