Hang on to that-it is as close to proof as the system where you are can give out at this point in time. The goal isn’t to be providing ‘id’, it is to be vaccinating people by getting the right amount of a vaccine (which they documented for you as to manufacturer and lot number) into an appropriate muscle the appropriate number of times. Twice for Pfizer and Moderna and once for Johnson and Johnson.
The state department of motor vehicles is in the business of providing ID and we all know how time-consuming and burdensome that is every time it has to be renewed and then you are only dealing with a twelfth of any state’s adult population in any one month.
Just in case, please understand I didn’t mean any of this to be snarky. If the vaccinating process starts to seem to be providing ID a whole slug of people will start staying away that we very much want to be coming in and getting vaccinated. I have been jabbed twice and didn’t have to show any ID either time. As I would want it to be.
Um, that’s not even vaguely proof of anything. What it IS is information that’s helpful to her medically care.
And fwiw, i took a photo of the piece of paper, and sent it to her doctor, along with a transcription of the actual information (Pfizer, lot, dose, date).
What did you want? I ask in case as someone who gave thousands upon thousands of public health vaccinations in the past I might be able to shed some light.
It is ‘proof’ of a dose of Pfizer vaccine Lot # ZYZ-XYX on such and such a date. It is legible ink printed on paper that you got to carry away with you. That is all any of us received, ink printed on a piece of paper. The paper and size might have varied. I have not heard of anyone in the US getting anything that we’d traditionally think of as proof-like a tamper resistant laminated license or permit.
This is a thread about whether people need to get a “card” when they are vaccinated. My reading of that is some sort of tangible evidence of having been vaccinated, like something that has a seal or is at least slightly hard to fake. I assume that the background is that there’s a lot of talk about “vaccine passports”, something that’s actually being implemented in Israel.
I don’t think it’s going to be implemented in the US. And I present as evidence that my mom didn’t get anything remotely suitable for that purpose.
She did get a written record, which is useful, but it’s useful for completely different purposes. Like being able to look up if there’s a recall of lots xx-yy because they were mishandled, and anyone who got those lots needs to be revaccinated or something.
I suppose if my mom ever needs proof of being vaccinated she’ll get a note from her doctor, just like kids do to go to public school.
Thanks. Now I understand-it was as I hoped, we were just talking past each other. Easy to do with written communication. I think you are exactly right about it being like when kids need a record to go to school-ask the entity you got the shot from, in my case, the public health dept of my county of residence. Somewhere in the bowels of their computer system are tracings that someone claiming to be me, giving my birthdate, got jabbed twice under their auspices. If ever needed, they could verify that and confirm the Lot numbers.
Anyone with a Xerox machine and a piece of white card stock could phony up what I received, even though it has the CDC’s logo on it, which kinda sorta makes it look official. I’m sorry your mom didn’t at least get one of those. Fits better in a purse or billfold at least. If the US ever goes to needing a tamper-resistant vaccine passport we are going to have a bunch of wealthy counterfeiters overnight. I’m hoping it never comes to that.
I have one of those neat little smallpox vaccine scars on my shoulder to prove I was vaccinated-at least I never lost that ‘proof’ like I did college diplomas or marriage certificate, etc. Shoulders are much easier to find than pieces of paper or laminated chip-imprinted cards.
I think the talk about vaccine passport being tossed around as far as I can tell mostly in Europe, has complicated things and worried some people.
As an aside, at the clinic I’m working at the label ink smears - especially with hand sanitizer. We’ve been recommending that you laminate them - or at least throw some clear packing tape over the label.
I think if you get vaccinated outside of your healthcare system, your PCP should be able to get it into your medical record and make you a new card if needed. Right now they aren’t needed for anything, but I can see them being needed for international travel in the future - and maybe even some domestic travel, depending on how close we get to herd immunity.
Spousal unit and I have both been shot and we got cards at the VFD where our county has the biggest distribution point. This morning, we scanned the cards, printed out copies to go in our wallets, and I’ve filed the originals with our important personal papers. I’ve also got an electronic copy - I think I’ll send it to my phone.
We’re hoping to go on a cruise this summer, and I’m sure the cards will be required.
That didn’t work when I needed it. When I started at UCBerkeley in 1969, I had to prove I had the smallpox vax. My idiot parents never kept any medical records for me (or at least they never passed any of that stuff on to me), and the only proof I had of the smallpox vax was the distinctive scar on my arm.
They wouldn’t accept that as proof. I had to get a new vax. The UCBerkeley medical dept (there was a hospital on campus) gave me one, at no extra charge.
They still didn’t give me a certificate I could keep.
BTW: I get the flu shot every year for the last 20 years; got the zostavax and both shingrix vaxes; and all the pneumono vaxes, and nobody EVER gave me a card or certificate to prove it, let alone information like the lot number. Maybe my current HMO has some of that in their records for me. Maybe.
I’ve never gotten a card when I got a shot as an adult - but then again, I’ve never needed a record of my flu shot*. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t records The pharmacy has records of the immunizations I got there ( I can see the records in my prescription history, including the lot number) and since they asked for my doctor’s info, they may have sent it there as well. The reason you never got a card or certificate to prove you got the flu shot or the shingles shot was because you didn’t need it - if you needed proof for your job that you had XYZ vaccination, the provider would have given you proof of some sort and if you needed certain immunizations for international travel, you would have gotten proof. The main reason for the COVID vaccine certificate is because it seems likely that many people will need to prove that they are vaccinated to avoid testing before entering events or to avoid quarantine after travel.
Both my kids and I had a yellow card that had our childhood immunicazation records.
My in-laws got their first COVID vaccines a few weeks ago at CVS on different days at different locations, and both got a vaccine card. On their second shot, they both went back to the same CVS they first went to on different days and my FIL was handed his completed card before he left, but my MIL was not - she said they kept it.
My wife interrogated her to tears about not getting that card as she left. We were all scratching our heads as to why the process is so inconsistent. We later determined that both of them received an email with their vaccine date, lot, location administered, etc. that was also sent to their doctors. I figured, as long as their doctors have a record of their vaccination, all good.
AIUI the card is more of a back-up or handy reference about your vaccination (given how easy they can be forged), but the system of record is really your state’s vaccine registry, which I would assume your doctor will have access to. I would also assume a health care provider will also have records of all your vaccinations.
A lot of assumptions there, and given the new and fluid nature of this process, I am thinking it prudent to have that card in your possession for the time being until something more formal is established. However, it seems like a lot of people are not being given the card, so the process remains a bit inconsistent.
I always get a vaccine record from my PCP’s office before I travel. While it doesn’t show lot numbers, it has the vax name, any specifiers (“quadrivalent”), the route (“oral”), the dose, and the date for each.