New Delhi: As the news about the UK has revised its travel policy to include Covishield as an approved vaccine percolated yesterday, the British High Commission in New Delhi issued a statement saying that its government is "working with India to expand recognition of vaccine certification". Now things are getting clearer as one reads the in-between the lines of the statement.
The UK updated its travel guidance, clarifying that the formulations of Covishield qualify it as an “approved” vaccine but not the Covid-19 certificates issued by India. Literally, this means that Indian travellers will be treated as “unvaccinated”. Further, they will still have to take a pre-departure RT-PCR test, followed by RT-PCR tests on Day 2 and Day 8 of arrival, and undergo quarantine for 10 days.
The British High Commissioner to India Alex Ellis said: “We are clear Covishield is not a problem. The UK is open to travel and we are already seeing a lot of people going from India to the UK… Over 62,500 student visas have been issued in the year ending June 2021… We want to make the process of travelling as easy as possible… We have been having detailed technical discussions regarding certification, with the builders of the CoWIN app and the NHS app.”
National Health Authority (NHA) CEO Dr R S Sharma talking to a national daily said the NHA has not received “any official communication” from the UK government. “We had meetings on September 16 and September 21. They explained their system and we explained our system. They sent a message that technical discussions have been completed and to their satisfaction. There were no concerns,” Sharma said.
Sharma went on add that India’s vaccination certificate was WHO-compliant, except on the minor issue of providing complete details of birth. The "CoWIN platform allows travellers to enter complete details for the purpose of international travel".
