Vaccine certificates available for Scots travelling abroad

The Scottish Government has announced a “vaccine passport” scheme for people to show confirmation they have had the vaccine on travelling abroad.

Vaccination status letters can be downloaded from the NHS Inform patient portal via https://www.nhsinform.scot/covid19status or people can call the free Covid Status Helpline and ask for it to be posted out.

Chief medical officer Dr Gregor Smith continued to urge caution, saying Scots should limit travel abroad and advised avoiding overseas holidays.

He said: “Given the risk of returning with infection, and especially of introducing new variants of the virus, we continue to be highly cautious about international travel.

“Everyone should continue to limit their travel abroad and while I understand the need for some people who want to reunite with family, when it comes to holidays, my advice continues to be play it safe and staycation this summer.

“For those that do need it, this new service will provide people with a record of their vaccination status for outbound international travel.

“They should only access their record if they are planning to travel within 21 days and it is a requirement of their destination.”

The Scottish Government said the measures are intended to ease the burden on the NHS by removing the need for people to ask their GP for a status record.

As Scotland’s vaccination programme progresses, vaccination status will be replaced by digital Covid Status Certificates, which will include vaccination and testing data to be used for outbound international travel.