Calls made for ‘Covid passports’ to prove vaccination
Labour’s candidate for West Midlands Mayor has called for people to be issued with ‘Covid passports’ to prove they have been vaccinated.
Liam Byrne says the document would allow the region to “unlock the economy quickly” as it bids to bounce back from the pandemic.
The measure has been unveiled as part of the Birmingham MP’s ‘mass-vax’ plan to accelerate the roll out of the jab across the Midlands.
He claims the plan will enable 1.6 million people in priority groups across the region to be vaccinated before Valentine’s Day.
In a report on his proposals, Mr Byrne calls for “good systems” to be brought in “to record who has been vaccinated so that we can equip people with a Covid passport”.
The passport would also log track and trace data, the report adds.
The five-point plan also calls for the formation of a taskforce under Conservative West Midlands Mayor Andy Street, linking NHS providers with local councils and public services to triple current vaccine delivery capacity.
Mr Byrne called for the jab to be administered from more settings, including pharmacies.
He demanded a regional supply of 300,000 jabs a week, which he said would enable all priority patients to be vaccinated by February 12.
He also pushes for the mobilisation of a “vaccination field force” of at least 2,600 people – including medical students – to help administer the jab.
Mr Byrne said: “Vaccine is the fastest way out of lockdown. The sooner everyone is safe, the sooner we can get back to normal.
"The leaders of the key pharmaceutical companies are telling us they can ship what we can jab. So we need to throw everything at a mass-vax programme – and we need to do it now.
"Too many have lost their lives and livelihoods.
"The tragedy is our country has one of the worst death rates in the world, and one of world’s the biggest shock to the economy.
“We can’t go on like this. We have to pull together like never before to jab like never before.”
Announcing the latest national lockdown on Monday, Boris Johnson revealed that 1.3 million people in the UK have received the jab since the roll out began on December 8.
