B.C. residents have been waiting, mostly eagerly, for some sort of vaccination card that might simplify access to businesses and venues affected by coming restrictions imposed by the provincial health officer. Effective Sept. 13, anyone aged 12+ will need to show proof of vaccination to get into certain events and businesses in BC.
A few hours ahead of an unveiling of the new vaccine “passport,” the B.C. Ministry of Health ran a somewhat unexpected soft launch of the site that would be used to generate such a document. It was quickly overrun with demand, underscoring various polls that have shown widespread support for a means of simplifying proof of vaccination.
For instance, a recent Insights West poll (conducted Aug. 11-13) gave a measure of this support for vaccine cards or passports. “As an overall concept, the vast majority (79 per cent) of B.C. residents support the idea of proof of double-vaccinations in order to participate in various activities, with 57 per cent who ‘strongly support’ the idea and 22 per cent who ‘somewhat support’ the idea. Only 19 per cent are opposed to the concept. It’s not surprising that the 84 per cent of B.C residents in our poll who have been double vaccinated show overwhelming support for the idea (88 per cent support), versus the opposite for unvaccinated, where 34 per cent support the idea, and 63 per cent show opposition to the concept.”
As it was, I happened to be in a coffee shop chatting with a friend when we both decided to see if the provincial vaccine card might have been launched ahead of the official rollout time. We’ve both talked about the pros and cons of such a card for many months and we were both surprised to see it already running at around 9 a.m. instead of at the anticipated 2 p.m. rollout time.
I didn’t apply for my card then and there in the coffee shop using free Wi-Fi, although the indicated wait time of only a minute or two was tempting. By the time I arrived home, the queue on the health ministry site gov.bc.ca/vaccinecard had reached 20 minutes. I fired up two computers to take care of three applications. Having a visual, virtual queue is actually a clever move on the part of the health ministry as it removes most of the crash notices that came with earlier vaccination booking sites.
Once the queue expires, the actual application form is clear and simple: provide your personal health number, your date of birth through drop-down selections, and the date of one of your actual vaccinations, as recorded on your health authority card.
Unfortunately, at that stage, for me at least, in all three applications, came evidence of the demand for the BC Vaccine Card. I was met with an ominous error notification. Fortunately rather than starting over I found that simply clicking on the Save button repeatedly eventually led to success and I was presented with the option to download a copy.
Knowing that any additional action could precipitate more woe I quickly took a screenshot, and also made a snip of the image of just the Vaccine Card. Only then did I commit to the Copy action, which also generated more error notices. Again, repeatedly clicking on the Copy button eventually bypassed the error and a PDF of the card downloaded to the local computer hard drive.
It is important to note that I didn’t try this application procedure on my mobile or on a tablet PC. My tests were conducted on a Windows 10 box and a Chromebook.
Aside from the errors I encountered I wonder about the saving process itself. If you right-click Save As (a common way to save images) on the QR code itself, the file created does not have an image extension and may show as a “blank” file. However, loading that file does display the QR code. If you right-click anywhere other than on the code itself, on what you might think of as the card itself, you do not get the option to save anything other than the raw page HTML.
I’m wondering if the PDF route will be problematic. PDF apps are notoriously bad on mobiles. For now it might be wise to print a paper copy of that PDF and carry it with you.
Premier John Horgan, Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry, and Health Minister Adrian Dix used their Tuesday, Sept. 7 news conference that rolled out BC’s Vaccine Card program to issue impassioned pleas to the unvaccinated to avail themselves of clinics across the province.
Horgan in particular noted that vaccination clinics have seen a 200 per cent increase in demand since the initial announcement of the card . “We have made the BC Vaccine Card easy for people to get,” he said, “and easy for businesses to check at a glance. The card is a significant step in getting our economy running on all cylinders, and returning to social events safely with the confidence that those around us are also fully vaccinated.”
This last claim remains to be tested. Businesses will have access to a verifier app, but they are also being permitted to run “visual identification” in which the gatekeeper glances at the Vaccine Card (I think this has to be more than just the QR code by itself, it must include the body of the card) and matches it up with a piece of approved identification.
Your paper immunization card will suffice as proof until the full phase-in of the Vaccine Card program on Sept. 27. That’s the small card issued through your local health authority. And if all this talk of generating your Vaccine Card through a computer has you feeling overwhelmed, there are alternatives available. By phone, 1-833-838-2323, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. seven days a week, or through a Service BC government office.
Sept. 15 update: the Vaccine Card has proven wildly popular. The creation and saving process has been simplified and now works as it should. The reader app for businesses is in use and proving to be highly efficient. Although there was early talk of a legal challenge of the card program itself from various groups, that seems to have been muted somewhat with the wide acceptance it has found.
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