The requirement of a blockchain-based platform for monitoring vaccine status can drastically reduce risk of virus transmission, especially because we are talking about vaccinating billions of people. It would be easier to track who has been vaccinated, who wasn’t, who receives future booster shots to accommodate new variants and so forth. Plus, given the unfortunate rise in fake vaccines, such as the thousands seized in South Africa and China, a blockchain-based passport is the best way to verify individuals have received a real vaccine. This is will be especially critical if tourism starts to ramp back up by the summer.
During the pandemic, many individuals and businesses have used 21st-century technology to work from home, yet proof of vaccination currently is a 19th-century piece of paper that can be lost. A digital vaccine passport on its own is not completely secure, but adding blockchain is a game changer that could save lives. More places are likely to require proof of vaccination as time goes on.
A blockchain-verified vaccine passport would help instill consumer confidence and trust, which in turn could encourage more people to go back into office buildings, into restaurants and to the city’s world-famous landmarks.
We also could use blockchain to track individual vaccines, to ensure not a single dose gets wasted. The technology can track whether a vaccine has been properly stored, is at the right temperature, was distributed to the right location and so forth.
Incorporating blockchain into vaccine passports and even the supply chain could help bring traces of normalcy back to our lives.
Allen Alishahi and Chao Cheng-Shorland are co-founders of DocuWalk, a blockchain-based virtual negotiating platform.