December 31, 2020

Andrew Campbell 

Los Angeles County and Apple have jointly developed a digital app on iPhones to keep track of the status of the COVID-19 vaccine recipients. Apple AAPL Wallet can now hold easy and reliable credentials of their vaccination status.

The LA County partnered with the tech healthcare Healthvana and issued a digitized vaccine verification record to the vaccine recipients stored in their iPhone Wallet. It works like a COVID vaccine passport application in order to allow people to travel, shop, and many activities with crowds such as concerts, movie theaters, offices, stadiums.

Earlier, there has been the CommonPass app initiated by the Common Trust Network, a Geneva-based nonprofit “the Commons Project” and the World Economic Forum for several airlines including Cathay Pacific, JetBlue, Lufthansa, Swiss Airlines, United Airlines, and Virgin Atlantic. The CommonPass app created in the form of a QR code allows travelers to upload medical data and can be shown to authorities information such as a COVID test, a vaccination proof by a hospital or medical professional, and a health certificate or pass.

Other tech firms are developing similar applications. For instance, IBM developed its own app, Digital Health Pass, to serve companies and venues with customized indicators for storing credentials of coronavirus tests, temperature checks, and vaccination proofs in users’ smartphone wallet.

Photo:Webshot.