The nonprofit biometric technology company Simprints welcomed Gavi CEO Dr. Sania Nishtar on a visit to Ghana to witness vaccination verification via biometric scanning. Gavi (The Vaccine Alliance) states their agenda is “Leaving no one behind with immunization.” One of Gavi’s founding members is the Gates Foundation.
African countries are rapidly adopting biometric systems which scan citizens faces, fingerprints, eyeballs and occasionally voices to verify their identity. These identification systems are also being tied to digital ID smartphone apps. The systems are necessary for conducting regular business and life activities such as opening a bank account, purchasing property, driving, receiving medical care, filing taxes and many others. In addition to these activities, a person’s biometrics may now be tied to their vaccination record.
“Ghana has been leading the way in the adoption of new tools like biometrics to improve patient identification. The Ghana Health Service (GHS) has collaborated with Simprints to use privacy-first biometric ID within its digital health registries to track the delivery of routine immunizations and boost coverage rates,” Biometric Update said. “Gavi, The Vaccine Alliance is a public-private global health partnership that aims to increase access to immunization in low income countries. Simprints CEO Toby Norman said it was an honor to welcome Dr. Nishtar to see their technology in action in clinics.”
Due to many people in the third world African nation living effectively outdoors in remote areas and lacking basic civilizational standards, entrusting the citizenry to hold on to paper vaccination records is not an effective option. Due to the nation’s burgeoning interest in biometrics however, the notion of linking a persons fingerprints and face scan to a digital, online, medical record containing vaccinations is not a surprise. Regardless of the Ghanan’s possessions or lack thereof, a scan of their biometrics will reveal if they had been vaccinated.
“In partnership with Ghana’s Ministry of Health, we’re deploying Simprints privacy-first biometric ID to trace the delivery of malaria and routine immunizations to rapidly identify dropouts or zero-dose children,” Simprints CEO Toby Norman said.
Simprints’ technology enabled the creation of more than 65,000 unique medical records in Ghana, although worldwide in 2024 the firm delivered more than 551,000 biometrically verified health services.
Biometric verification of patients is not limited to the third world however. Numerous health systems in the U.S. use biometric systems from other manufacturers to verify patients on check-in, linking their bodies to their medical records and thus vaccinations.
While these systems can reduce medical errors due to mixups of patient records, when tied to a biometric identification card that’s required to access services from financial institutions or the government, failure to comply with vaccination mandates may result in inability to deposit a check, withdraw cash, purchase property or drive a car, in theory.