Health experts encourage White House to support vaccine passports

White House faces calls to embrace vaccine passports Health experts are calling on the Biden administration to do more to encourage and promote the use of vaccine mandates and passports. So far, the White House has stayed out of what they view as an Nathaniel Weixel TheHill

Health experts are calling on the Biden administration to do more to encourage and promote the use of vaccine mandates and passports.

So far, the White House has stayed out of what they view as an issue for private employers.

The Biden administration has repeatedly said vaccine passports won’t be implemented at the federal level but has not discouraged individual companies from making the personal choice of implementing one.

Officials have also shied away from using mandates among federal employees or among military forces.

“If a company, a business wants to take steps to keep their workers and their passengers safe, I would think that, from a government perspective, we want to do everything we can to encourage that,” Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg said recently.

There is no way to tell who is vaccinated and who is not without asking for proof, but the federal government has not given any kind of guidance or support to businesses that want to require proof of vaccination for customers and employees. 

With the nation poised to miss President Biden's July 4 goal of 70 percent partial vaccination, experts argue that more vocal support of mandates and passports could help to boost lagging vaccination rates.

“The Biden administration shouldn't be so squeamish about vaccine verification,” said Leana Wen, a public health professor at George Washington University and former health commissioner of Baltimore. 

Wen said the administration should have supported a standardized verification system, calling it a “missed opportunity” to increase vaccine uptake.

Some people may just be waiting for the right incentive, and a mandate may push them in the right direction, she said.

“There are a lot of people in the middle. They're not eager to get the vaccine, but they're also not anti-vaxxers. They need an additional push. And that push is still not there, because we have not been requiring proof of vaccination in order to return to normal,” Wen said. ...