Finland to launch COVID-19 vaccination certification on 26 May

Finland’s digital COVID-19 vaccination certificate will be available as of 26 May in the My Kanta pages, said the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health and the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL) in a joint press release on Wednesday.

All the users, however, will not be able to view their vaccination certificate on the launch date.

The COVID-19 vaccination certificates will be available in stages, because it can take some time before vaccination information is updated in the My Kanta Pages as data in different patient information systems are being corrected retrospectively.

Some healthcare organisations may not be able to make the necessary changes to their patient information systems before the launch date of the Finnish COVID-19 vaccination certification.

In such cases users will be able to view their vaccination certificates sometime after the launch date.

Inaccurate recording of vaccination information by healthcare providers is another possible reason for a missing vaccination certificate or missing vaccination information in the My Kanta Pages.

In the future, users will be able to view their COVID-19 vaccination certificates in the My Kanta Pages within five days of vaccination.

Five days is the maximum time limit for transferring data to the Kanta Services under the Decree on Patient Documents.

Finland’s COVID-19 vaccination certificates available in the My Kanta Pages will contain information of the COVID-19 vaccinations received by the certificate-holders.

The Finnish certificate can be used only when crossing the border to an EU member state that accepts it as proof of COVID-19 vaccination. Each EU member state can decide whether a national vaccination certificate entitles the holder to cross its border. Therefore, the Finnish certificate does not mean that its holder can travel freely everywhere in the EU.

As of July, people in Finland will be able to use the EU COVID-19 certificate, called the Digital Green Certificate, which will cover three types of certificates: vaccination certificates, test certificates, and certificates for persons who have recovered from COVID-19. The three certificate types will be launched at the same time and they will be available in the My Kanta Pages. Once the Digital Green Certificate is available in Finland, it will replace the Finnish vaccination certificate.