Ezekiel Emanuel: National COVID Vaccination Database with QR Code ‘Would Have Been the Right Way to Go’

Former Biden transition team COVID adviser Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel on Friday pushed for a national database for COVID-19 vaccinations.

While discussing the “serious threat” of forged vaccination cards by people refusing to get the vaccine on MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports,” Emanuel said that he thinks a database where people can have a scannable QR code to get into events or board airplanes “would have been the right way to go” for the Biden administration. He explained this method would prevent a “spreader event” from people with faked cards.

“I think it’s a serious threat,” Emanuel said of forged vaccination cards. “I think it’s inevitable and have been saying it for months that we will be certifying whether people have been vaccinated or not to go to indoor events like theater or sporting events or even board airplanes or return to employment, and I understand why the administration really didn’t want to create a large database. I don’t think the privacy is really the concern. I think a lot of people … what they are really worried about is things like exploitation. Is it going to be commercialized? Is it going to fall into hands where people are going to use it for other reasons than the reasons that they certify? And I think … those are serious concerns. But so is forgery, and so is I’m going to an indoor spot, everyone says that they have been vaccinated but in fact haven’t and a spreading event is possible.”

“[T]here’s no easy solution here. But I do think not doing a national database whereby the QR code you can actually get in, having that be done by a not-for-profit, making sure it won’t be commercialized — I think that would have been the right way to go,” he added.

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