Kenya deploys digital platform to screen people for Covid-19 at airport

(4 minutes read)

·        The Jomo Kenyatta International Airport has adopted of the Trusted Travel digital platform meant to manage travels amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic

·        The airport authorities  have introduced a UK PCR-negative Covid-19 test and a completed Kenya Ministry of Health “Travellers Health Surveillance Form”, which allocates the bearer a personal QR code that facilitates and speeds up entry

·        The portal displays information about the latest travel restrictions, entry requirements, names of authorized laboratories and vaccination compliance information, as well as Africa CDC mutual recognition protocol for Covid-19 testing and test results and
vaccination certificates

The Jomo Kenyatta International Airport has adopted the Trusted Travel digital platform meant to manage travels amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The digitization made things easy and took much less time at the airport.

The airport authorities  have introduced a UK PCR-negative Covid-19 test and a completed Kenya Ministry of Health “Travellers Health Surveillance Form”, which allocates the bearer a personal QR code that facilitates and speeds up entry. On arrival in Nairobi airport just before entry into immigration,  the QR codes are  scanned and linked to the temperature screening camera, which displays the temperature profiles of the passengers. The tests  takes only very limited time and some passengers say less than 15 minutes or so. Incidentally, Kenya is the first country to adopt the platform.

The portal displays information about the latest travel restrictions, entry requirements, names of authorized laboratories and vaccination compliance information, as well as Africa CDC mutual recognition protocol for Covid-19 testing and test results and vaccination certificates. Tests conducted in any member state of the AU, and even countries outside Africa,  provided they can be verifiable in all other member states  if the labs in which the tests took place are in the digital loop.

Many have hailed the  innovative system which has been put in place by Kenya including the African Union. The platform has been   developed by PanaBIOS Consortium and Econet Group as a public-private partnership with Africa CDC, Trusted Travel is a top-class digital solution to support Member States in verifying COVID-19 tests . spread of Covid-19.

African Union through Africa CDC, in collaboration with PanaBios and Econet, will continue to provide technical support to the Government of Kenya in operational zing the platform and calls on other Member States to hook up to the platform for screening and verification of test results to ensure a safe public health corridor across the continent.