It has been a year since the pandemic struck us. Pandemic forced the world to adapt to conditions like lockdown and travel restrictions. This meant video conferencing tools like Zoom became the norm. Even Apple and Google collaborated for contact tracing technology. Now global airline industry body IATA says it is launching a digital travel pass for COVID-19 test results and vaccination for Apple devices by mid-April.

The digital pass is currently being tested and will launch by next month. It will be available for all iPhones running iOS 14 and above. Kamil Alawadhi, IATA Regional VP for Africa and the Middle East, says the digital pass will be available on iOS starting from April 15. The new feature does come with a caveat; different airlines need to adapt it to be successful. Alawadhi says, “But the application will only achieve its success once airlines, different countries, airports adopt it.”

Global airline industry body IATA said it would launch a digital travel pass for COVID-19 test results and vaccine certificates on the Apple platform in mid-April. The digital travel pass, currently in the testing phase, had been planned to be launched by next month.

Virgin Atlantic is already trialing the IATA app on London to Barbados route. Most importantly, Barbados accepts the pass at the border and is the first country to do so. The travel pass would help ease international travel during pandemic and we don’t see why airlines will not implement it.

Our Take

Apple has been very active when it comes to developing solutions for the post COVID world. Last month it came to light that Apple is working with WHO for vaccine passport solution. This week we learned that Apple had added COVID-19 info for more than 300 airports on Apple Maps.