Chris Justice, President BLOK BioScience, speaks to Laura Gelder

As the vaccination programme rolled out across the UK the travel trade let out a collective sigh of relief, despite the fact that ‘back to normal’ remains a way off yet. But Chris Justice from British bio-technology company BLOK BioScience, believes the Government is ignoring his company’s ready-made solution – one which could help agents by boosting customers’ confidence in booking holidays.

This January BLOK BioScience wrote to ministers to ask why the Government has commissioned building a vaccine passport app. “It doesn’t make sense for them to start this project from scratch when we have the solution already built,” says Justice. “With the vaccine roll-out now in full swing, the Government needs to act fast to introduce a tamper-proof and privacy-centric way for individuals to prove their vaccination and test status.”

BLOK BioScience launched its digital health pass BLOK Pass in December, which, alongside its testing solution, has been rolled out to care homes, gyms (including the David Lloyd group) and schools and will soon be used by tour operators, cruise lines and airlines too.

The app enables a staff member (which could potentially be immigration or airline check-in staff and potentially event or attraction security staff) to check the health status of a person by scanning their phone. The system then checks their health status and a traffic light system signals whether they are fit to enter (green), required to take an action such as a test (amber) or pose an infection risk and should not be given access (red).

Organisations can configure their own entry criteria around variables like Covid-19 test results and vaccination records, also integrating with third-party systems such as the NHS’ Test and Trace.

Justice is critical of the Government’s slow response to the travel industry’s plight. “They’ve been a bit of a closed shop and as a result they’ve been a day late and a pound short in developing protocols to get travel going,” he says.

He argues that the first step is having flexible test results that can be used as part of the criteria for accessing places. BLOK Pass uses lateral flow testing which can be done on-site at a fraction of the cost of PCR tests (the NHS standard test) and offers results in minutes rather than days – though they are less sensitive than PCR tests – making them well suited to the rapid ebb and flow of travel.

Many airlines are already using lateral flow tests but Justice believes the Government could play a more proactive role in creating standardised protocols which make use of this kind of test in the travel industry. He also believes that fears around lack of security for such personal data have impeded progress. “People are rightly concerned at how their personal data can be used and shared by companies,” says Justice.

The BLOK Pass is the only Covid-related health pass globally that is certified by the United Nations-backed ID2020, an alliance which aims to implement safe digital ID around the world. While centrally stored information can be tricky to protect, BLOK Pass gets around this problem by not creating a database at all – instead the individual’s health information is stored only their phone.

With Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab saying (in late January) that it was “too early” for Britons to book a summer holiday abroad, public confidence in travel lags behind a desire for it, but Justice thinks giving a framework like a health passport would reduce the uncertainty of travel.

He recognises that the BLOK Pass wouldn’t be the sole solution on the market but wants Downing Street to present the options.

“We want to be part of a solution which gives people confidence to carry their health credentials with them and opens up the freedom of travel,” he says.