South African-based Atter Pathology Services (APS) is the first African pathology network to sign up to the International Air Transport Association (IATA)’s Travel Pass, an app-based record of a person’s verified Covid-19 vaccination and test status that will facilitate cross border travel.
IATA represents 292 airlines from around the world, which makes up roughly 80% of the travel industry. Digital health passports like the IATA Travel Pass are likely to become the preferred tool to streamline international travel, as they are an effective way to make sure the various traveller requirements for different countries are being reliably met. The responsibility to get this right often falls on airline and airport staff, and having the correct, verified and up-to-date information on a person’s Covid-19 immunity status readily available through the app will help them fulfill these obligations.
READ: Hot topic: Should we use health passports for event access?
Mike Atter, Co-founder of APS, says, “With our network of accredited molecular science labs, combined with our partnership with PreLink CloudLIMS, the premier Lab Information System (LIS) in the country, we offer the airlines and passengers the most secure platform of undertaking and received Covid-19 results. All of our electronic results are fully encrypted at rest and in transit with added QR code verification. We have complete compliance with POPIA, GDPR and HIPAA, as PreLink CloudLIMS is hosted on the secure Microsoft Azure platform.
“All of our electronic results are fully encrypted at rest and in transit with added QR code verification. We have complete compliance with POPIA, GDPR and HIPAA, as PreLink CloudLIMS is hosted on the secure Microsoft Azure platform.”
“Not only is our network about restoring confidence to travel but it has the full functionality of being able to integrate/interface with all current pathology laboratories, both state and private.”
APS is Dis-Chem’s Covid-19 testing partner for their national drive through testing sites. The company is also able to offer the safe and secure uploading of vaccine records to health passports like IATA’s Travel Pass, and at scale. It is now in discussions with several international airlines to encourage the first South African trials of the Travel Pass, with the hope of encouraging air travel to the country to resume.
APS is also in discussions with the Western Cape Government task team to assist with the province’s vaccine roll out.
Photo credit: Governor Tom Wolf on Flickr
