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‘Many people who have been vaccinated against COVID-19 abroad will now be able to have their vaccination registered, receive a green COVID-19 certificate, and thus be exempt from travel quarantine or have it shortened,’ says Minister of Health and Care Services Bent Høie.
People who have been fully vaccinated with a vaccine that has been approved by the EMA will thus be exempt from travel quarantine.
It has taken some time to develop a variable in SYSVAK for vaccines administered abroad, and to establish guidelines for the actual data entry.
The variable is now in place, so that vaccine doses administered abroad must be labelled in the register and thus can be distinguished from doses administered in Norway, which is important for follow-up of the COVID-19 vaccination programme in Norway. It is also important that the Norwegian Institute of Public Health has correct data on the number of Norwegians vaccinated and the number of vaccine doses used in Norway.
Online consultation before arrival in Norway
The information can be registered before you travel to Norway. In order to document your vaccination abroad, you must book a consultation with a general practitioner, the municipal health service, or a private health provider in Norway.
This should take the form of an online/video consultation where the doctor is shown the vaccine documentation and can make a discretionary assessment as to whether it can be approved as documentation or not.
All vaccination must be entered into a separate record, in addition to registration in SYSVAK.
‘It is important that the health personnel that will be entering vaccination data receive good guidance, so that they are confident that the information is as correct as possible. Such guidance is now available on the Norwegian Institute of Public Health's website’, states Mr Høie.
Patients will have to pay for the vaccine registration consultation. If the consultation is with the patient's general practitioner, the patient must pay the full fee because it will not be covered by the benefits budget.
Only EMA-approved vaccines
The Norwegian Institute of Public Health has recommended that only EMA-approved vaccines be registered in SYSVAK. This will apply regardless of where in the world the vaccine doses were administered. We have information about the quality, security, and effect of the vaccines that have been approved by the EMA, and all vaccines used in Norway require EMA approval. Registration of non-EMA-approved vaccines in SYSVAK may be considered at a later point.
At present, these vaccines do not confer any rights in the form of an exemption from or reduction in travel quarantine, nor do they qualify for a green COVID-19 certificate.
The Norwegian Institute of Public Health publishes guidelines regarding data entry. Read more at FHI.no.