COVID-19 may have caught much of the planet by surprise in late 2019 and early 2020, but much of the groundwork for the technology now widely used as a “response” to the pandemic was conceptualized and developed years prior. In the U.S. and throughout the world, there has been a recent push to implement a variety of “vaccine passport” regimes, many of which rely on digital technologies such as mobile applications to carry a record of — so far, at least — one’s COVID-19 vaccination records. These “tools” are presented by public officials and significant sections of the media in recent weeks and months as an inevitability of sorts, a technological progression as natural as breathing. They are also presented as a “new” response to an unprecedented crisis. These technological applications are touted as a means of keeping businesses open and ensuring “peace of mind” for members of the public who remain wary about entering public spaces.But just how new is this “new” technology? And will the use of technology be limited to COVID vaccinations, or for purposes of “health?” International ‘alliances’ backing the melding of ‘Big Tech’ and ‘Big Health’ It was the beginning of the preceding decade, January 2010, when Bill Gates, via the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, proclaimed “[w]e must make this the decade of vaccines,” adding that “innovation will make it possible to save more children than ever before.” In launching this so-called “Decade of Vaccines,” the Gates Foundation pledged $10 billion in funding. But Gates wasn’t the only actor behind this initiative. For instance, the “Decade of Vaccines” program used a model originating from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health to project the potential impact of vaccines on childhood deaths throughout the decade to come. And the announcement for the “Decade of Vaccines” initiative was made at that year’s annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) https://noqreport.com/2021/12/15/digital-surveillance-