Almost six years ago, I became one of the first people in the world to be an Estonian e-Resident 🙂 I had to physically go there to get finger-printed and prove that I was biologically alive, and after that I got an e-identity tied to it which allowed me to transact within Estonia’s (and partially EU’s) trust system remotely.
The very next day I had to rush myself to ER with an extremely painful case of kidney stones. I got to use my freshly acquired e-Resident card to navigate the medical system 😂. No one spoke much English and at that time I knew no Estonian or Russian. When I was eventually discharged and I went to the pharmacy, I just had to show them my card and they already knew my prescription.
So the system worked quite flawlessly. But there was human error in the prescription and I had to rush myself back into the ER after 3 days of writhing in intense pain. That was a great way to officially start my e-Residency 😜
The Estonian e-resident program makes me feel like we are one step closer to the world depicted in Snow Crash. XD