ABSTRACT
Background: In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, countries are introducing digital passports that allow citizens to return to normal activities if they were previously infected with (immunity passport) or vaccinated against (vaccination passport) SARS-CoV-2. To be effective, policy decision-makers must know whether these passports will be widely accepted by the public and under what conditions. This study focuses attention on immunity passports, as these may prove useful in countries both with and without an existing COVID-19 vaccination program;however, our general findings also extend to vaccination passports.Objective: We aimed to assess attitudes toward the introduction of immunity passports in six countries, and determine whatMethods: We collected 13,678 participants through online representative sampling across six countries-Australia, Japan, Taiwan, Germany, Spain, and the United Kingdom-during April to May of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, and assessed attitudes and support for the introduction of immunity passports.Results: Immunity passport support was moderate to low, being the highest in Germany (775/1507 participants, 51.43%) and the United Kingdom (759/1484, 51.15%);followed by Taiwan (2841/5989, 47.44%), Australia (963/2086, 46.16%), and Spain (693/1491, 46.48%);and was the lowest in Japan (241/1081, 22.94%). Bayesian generalized linear mixed effects modeling was used to assess predictive factors for immunity passport support across countries. International results showed neoliberal worldviews (odds ratio [OR] 1.17, 95% CI 1.13-1.22), personal concern (OR 1.07, 95% CI 1.00-1.16), perceived virus severity (OR 1.07, 95% CI 1.01-1.14), the fairness of immunity passports (OR 2.51, 95% CI 2.36-2.66), liking immunity passports (OR 2.77, 95% CI 2.61-2.94), and a willingness to become infected to gain an immunity passport (OR 1.6, 95% CI 1.51-1.68) were all predictive 0.61, 95% CI 0.57-0.65), and risk of harm to society (OR 0.71, 95% CI 0.67-0.76) predicted a decrease in support for immunity
ABSTRACT
The COVID-19 global pandemic has brought into sharp focus the urgency of tackling the question of how globalized humanity responds to a global societal threat, which can adversely affect a large portion of the human population. Changing geospatial distribution of COVID-19 morbidity paints a gloomy picture of cross-national differences in human vulnerabilities across the globe. We describe the dynamic nexus among societal – particularly pathogen – threat, social institutions, and culture, and discuss collectivism (ingroup favouritism and outgroup avoidance) and tightness (narrow prescription of behaviours and severe punishment of norm violations) as potential cultural adaptations to prevalent pathogen threats. We then sketch out a theoretical framework for cultural dynamics of collective adaptation to pathogen threats, outline a large number of theory- and policy-relevant research questions and what answers we have at present, and end with a call for renewed efforts to investigate collective human responses to societal threats. © The Author(s) 2021.