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OPINION 17.12.2020 Kevin-James Fenech Kevin is the founder and owner of JOB Search - jobsearch.mt and FENCI Consulting fenci.eu. He is a management consultant and business advisor by profession, focusing on strategy, human resources and recruitment. He has a passion for anything related to business and has written about the topic for over 10 years in most major newspapers or journals T he good news is that the vaccine is now a reality. e not so good news is that our life will not neces- sarily go back to how it used to be. In the words of pop group REM: 'It's the end of the world as we know it' and I don't necessarily 'feel fine' about it! e talk is that whilst the vaccine is safe and health authorities recommend that most people take it, the EU bu- reaucrats are planning 'Proof of Vacci- nation' (aka Vaccine Passports) which effectively means we will not be able to travel abroad unless one has taken the vaccine. I think that with this single, seeming- ly well intentioned, imposition the EU would effectively have put a stop to the world as we knew it pre-COVID19. I also believe that this will set a danger- ous new precedent which will bring about unintended consequences that will negatively impact all of us. I am worried that 'Proof of Vaccine' will scope creep into other areas of 'nor- mal life' and slowly but surely some of our basic freedoms will be lost irrevo- cably. I mean if we are going to be asked 'Proof of Vaccine' when travelling, who is to say that other situations won't re- quire it as well? What if companies start to request the same from existing or prospective employees? Will it soon become common practice for instance for companies to ask job applicants for their CV, qualifications/ certificates and 'Proof of Vaccine'? Or insurance companies selling life assur- ance and banks providing bank loans to request the same? Or employers ask- ing employees. Where do you draw the line? Granted, I am to some extent specu- lating, in order to highlight what might be inside Pandora's box. Yet the truth remains that 'Proof of Vaccine' can become a trojan horse for many other things. us it is only fair to ask: Are we heading into a new era of Digital Health Passports becoming the norm in the EU including Malta and for what purpose will they be used? My advice would be to all parties con- cerned to take a step-back and carefully reflect, since mandatory 'Proof of Vac- cine' has consequences which I don't think our freedom loving politicians necessarily desire and the Maltese gov- ernment needs to take a strong position vis-a-vis the EU on this matter, imme- diately. Granted, COVID-19 has traumatised people across Europe and governments, including the Maltese government for that matter, have found it all too easy to impose public health restrictions and curtail liberties/freedoms during the pandemic but post-vaccine all this needs to scaled back and in some cases reversed back to how things were before. I can understand Vaccine Passports being needed to kick-start travel in 2021 but once 70%+ of EU citizens have been vaccinated, I see no reason why 'Proof of Vaccine' should remain a mandatory requirement for travel or any other pur- pose. Otherwise we run the risk of various actors in the economy, also insisting on 'Proof of Vaccine' and later Digital Health Passports and before you know it you've opened up a whole Pandora's box. My understanding is that WHO isn't clear on the subject, anyway. On the one hand, Dr. Catherine Smallwood, Senior Emergency Officer at WHO Europe during a press briefing in Copenhagen on 4 December stated: 'We do not recommend immunity passports nor do we recommend test- ing as a means to prevent transmission across borders…' yet a colleague of hers, a certain Dr. Siddhartha Sankar Datta during the same press briefing stated '….For the vaccination passport for the travellers... we are looking very close- ly into the use of technology in this COVID-19 response and one of them is how can we work with member states towards a something called an e-vacci- nation certificate, an electronic vaccine certificate.' I, therefore, respectfully ask decision makers to favour 'recommended guide- lines' rather than anything mandatory and 'Proof of Vaccine' should only be a temporary measure irrevocably ending on 31 December 2021. e vaccine is crucial to ending the uncertainty, economic hardship and restoring business confidence meaning we welcome it with open arms but this mustn't come at the expense of future loss of freedoms. Our leaders need to balance today's public health needs without jeopardiz- ing future freedoms and liberties; they need to render 'Proof of Vaccine' as a means to an end i.e. kick-starting the economic recovery. Alas, however, I fear that the words of Morpheus from the film e Matrix could apply to our current situation: 'You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it.' Let us tread carefully, think through our de- cisions and their possible future con- sequences and steer away from solving one current problem only to create an- other future problem. 'It's the end of the world as we know it' In The Matrix, Morpheus offers Neo the choice between a red pill, representing an uncertain future, and a blue pill, representing a beautiful prison

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