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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Business
Anna Tims

I can’t update my Covid vaccine record to get a vital pass in Italy

Having the right Covid paperwork is vital for moving around in Italy, and the rules are set to get tougher.
Having the right Covid paperwork is vital for moving around in Italy, and the rules are set to get tougher. Photograph: Mara Duchetti/Alamy

My Covid booster vaccination in October does not appear on my NHS app, leaving me in a desperate situation. For the last month I’ve been in Italy where a “super green pass” is required for access to public transport and all indoor public spaces, but it expires 270 days after the last vaccination. My second jab, last April, is now invalid. I’ve been trying since November to get this resolved. The NHS website directed me to 119, which referred me to the Vaccine Data Resolution Service (VDRS). It was supposed to ring me within three weeks. Six weeks on, I’m still waiting, but the 119 number doesn’t work from Italy. I have had to cancel all future social and business arrangements and I am concerned that I may not even be able to access the airport to fly home. I cannot be the only one caught up in this.
MT, London

Indeed you are not, which is why the VDRS was set up for patients registered to an English GP who received their jab in England. NHS England wouldn’t comment on whether it’s struggling with a backlog of incomplete vaccine records, but in an email to you a caseworker explained that demand had been higher than expected.

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