As a consequence of the Sars-CoV-2 pandemic, the causative agent of the COVID-19 coronavirus, the world is currently witnessing profound changes in everyday life. The infection and the resulting death number forecasts generate an increasing threat to the lives of people and the economics of countries. As the acute phase of the pandemic ends, the greatest challenge that most governments are currently undergoing is the lack of tools to certify the immunity status of citizens and the related infection risk of the spread of the COVID-19 virus. To mitigate this challenge, this study proposes an innovative approach to implement a set of IT tools, here named VPassport, that assist large-scale test execution/result management in a distributed way and store the results of all tests made through all channels in a blockchain under country authority control. The proposed approach aims to produce an effective system able to support governments, health authorities, and citizens to take informed decisions on which services and social activities can be accessed respecting policies and rules set by the authorities. This aims to allow a controlled restart of the activities of the country, giving to all citizens the possibility to manage their immunity tests while allowing the authorities to manage the reopening of services and social activities. The proposed model helps in managing this phase and, therefore, the resulting outcome can be used to authorize possible behaviors (e.g., going to the office, production plants, public transportation, theaters, cinemas, etc.). The knowledge of being infected or not in a secure and not modifiable way that can be shown in a simple way, accessible to all, will be the real change in managing the coexistence with the virus until a vaccine will be available for all people.
Vpassport: A Digital Architecture to Support Social Restart during the SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic
Capece G;
2021-01-01
Abstract
As a consequence of the Sars-CoV-2 pandemic, the causative agent of the COVID-19 coronavirus, the world is currently witnessing profound changes in everyday life. The infection and the resulting death number forecasts generate an increasing threat to the lives of people and the economics of countries. As the acute phase of the pandemic ends, the greatest challenge that most governments are currently undergoing is the lack of tools to certify the immunity status of citizens and the related infection risk of the spread of the COVID-19 virus. To mitigate this challenge, this study proposes an innovative approach to implement a set of IT tools, here named VPassport, that assist large-scale test execution/result management in a distributed way and store the results of all tests made through all channels in a blockchain under country authority control. The proposed approach aims to produce an effective system able to support governments, health authorities, and citizens to take informed decisions on which services and social activities can be accessed respecting policies and rules set by the authorities. This aims to allow a controlled restart of the activities of the country, giving to all citizens the possibility to manage their immunity tests while allowing the authorities to manage the reopening of services and social activities. The proposed model helps in managing this phase and, therefore, the resulting outcome can be used to authorize possible behaviors (e.g., going to the office, production plants, public transportation, theaters, cinemas, etc.). The knowledge of being infected or not in a secure and not modifiable way that can be shown in a simple way, accessible to all, will be the real change in managing the coexistence with the virus until a vaccine will be available for all people.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.