Now, ‘international vaccine certificates’ made available on CoWin following UK complaint

The National Health Authority (NHA) has made vaccine certificates compliant with the World Health Organization’s (WHO) specifications, detailed in its Digital Documentation of Covid-19 Certificates: Vaccination Status.

The move comes after British authorities raised doubts over the format of India’s vaccination certificate, resulting in vaccinated travellers from the country being treated as unvaccinated.

The update includes mainly displaying the vaccinated person’s birth date on the certificate.

R.S. Sharma, the NHA CEO, tweeted on Thursday that India had ensured that the CoWIN certification was compliant with the WHO’s directives, as it attempts to build a world-class digital vaccination platform.

Sharma added that people travelling internationally could download an international version of the certificate, which would display the date of birth.

The UK amended its travel guidance earlier this month. It clarified that while the formulations of Covishield, developed jointly by AstraZeneca and Oxford University and manufactured under licence in India by Serum Institute of India, qualified as an “approved” vaccine, the certificates were not.

This meant Indians travelling to the UK would continue to be treated as unvaccinated when the country’s new travel rules become effective from October 4. According to the UK’s updated travel rules, unvaccinated people would have to undergo a pre-departure RT-PCR test, and tests on Day 2 and Day 8 following their arrival, apart from spending a 10-day isolation period at their destination address.

Sharma had said last week that there could be no concern because the product was as perfect as possible.

He added that it was QR code-based and verifiable.

India’s vaccination certificate was compliant with the WHO’s directives, except on the date of birth details, which he called a “minor issue”. Sharma said the government didn’t collect irrelevant information. He added that since passports already carried the date of birth, they only collected the birth year.

Even then, Sharma had said the CoWIN platform allowed travellers to enter all relevant details needed for international travel.