Vaccine Passports Convinced Fewer Than 1 Percent of Quebec, Ontario Residents to Get the Jab: Study

People walk by a sign at a restaurant advising customers of Quebec’s newly implemented COVID-19 vaccine passport in Montreal, on Sept. 6, 2021. (The Canadian Press/Graham Hughes)

Government-issued vaccine passports convinced a minimal number of people to get COVID-19 shots, accounting for less than 1 percent of people in Quebec and Ontario, according to a peer-reviewed study.

The passports, which were required for many people across Canada to enter any activity the government deemed non-essential—such as going to restaurants, movie theatres, swimming pools, concerts, sports, and bars—resulted in a rise of only 0.9 percentage points in the vaccination uptake rate in Quebec and 0.7 percentage points in Ontario, said the paper, “Impact of a vaccine passport on first-dose COVID-19 vaccine coverage by age and area-level social determinants in the Canadian provinces of Québec and Ontario: an interrupted time series analysis.”

The effect on vaccine uptake in the vulnerable elderly group of those over age 60 was even lower; only 0.1 percentage points got a shot following vaccine passports. The study noted that this was the most vaccinated age group.

The study was formally released in CMAJ Open Journal on Oct. 24, but was available in preprint, before it had been peer-reviewed, as of October 2022. The authors of the study said all Canadian provinces and the Yukon introduced vaccine passports in 2021 and discontinued them by April 2022. Some provinces allowed proof of a recent COVID-19 test instead of a passport showing vaccination proof.

Quebec and Ontario, the largest, most populated provinces, were among the first to announce vaccine passports in September 2021. The study notes that provincial governments said the policy was to “reduce SARSCoV-2 transmission,” but adds that the “evidence on their effectiveness at incentivizing” COVID vaccination uptake “remains limited.”

The study considered vaccinated numbers before vaccine passports were made mandatory for non-essential activities in Quebec and Ontario and simulated what the results would have been if passports had not been implemented.

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Among young people aged 12 to 17, the least likely group to get COVID shots in both provinces, the study said passports increased the rate of vaccination by 2.3 percentage points in Quebec and 1.3 percentage points in Ontario.

The Canadian Press contributed to this report.