Tracking and Nudging through Smartphone Apps: Public Health and Decisional Privacy in a European Health Union

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 831-840
Author(s):  
Josephine VAN ZEBEN ◽  
Bart A. KAMPHORST
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Personal Information ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Informational Privacy ◽  
Future Health ◽  
Eu Member States ◽  
Health Measures ◽  
Use Of Technology ◽  
European Health ◽  
The Right

In response to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, European Union (EU) Member States adopted technological solutions aimed at mitigating the effects of the virus, as well as enforcing newly adopted public health measures. Examples include apps for disseminating information, performing self-diagnosis, enforcing home quarantine orders and aiding contact tracing. This extensive use of technology for tracking and promoting public health raises important questions regarding EU citizens’ privacy. Thus far, the discourse in this regard has predominantly revolved around data protection, the risk of surveillance and the right to control access over one’s personal information (informational privacy). In light of the push towards a more unified approach to mitigating the current pandemic and future health crises through a European Health Union (EHU), we consider a different dimension of privacy that may be at risk when employing technology for public health, namely the right to non-interference with one’s decisions (decisional privacy). In particular, this article focuses on whether the advances in health-related persuasive technology, together with a more general movement towards “nudging” as an individual and public health tool, will require EU legislation to further protect decisional privacy by regulating “hypernudging” technologies and to guide the EHU in coordinating public health measures that utilise these technologies in a privacy-preserving way.

The complication of cyber manhunt: How cyber manhunt further complicated the ethical conflict between breaching the confidentiality and endangering the society in face of the COVID-19 pandemic (Preprint)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yen-Chang Chen ◽  
Yen-Yuan Chen
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Health Workers ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Personal Information ◽  
Public Health Intervention ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Online Activity ◽  
Contact Investigation ◽  
The Impact

UNSTRUCTURED While health care and public health workers are working on measures to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic, there is an unprecedentedly large number of people spending much more time indoors, and relying heavily on the Internet as their lifeline. What has been overlooked is the influence of the increasing online activities on public health issues. In this article, we pointed out how a large-scale online activity called cyber manhunt may threaten to offset the efficacy of contact tracing investigation, a public health intervention considered highly effective in limiting further transmission in the early stage of a highly contagious disease outbreak such as the COVID-19 pandemic. In the first section, we presented a case to show how personal information obtained from contact investigation and disclosed in part on the media provoked a vehement cyber manhunt. We then discussed the possible reasons why netizens collaborate to reveal anonymized personal information about contact investigation, and specify, from the perspective of public health and public health ethics, four problems of cyber manhunt, including the lack of legitimate public health goals, the concerns about privacy breach, the impact of misinformation, and social inequality. Based on our analysis, we concluded that more moral weight may be given to protecting one's confidentiality, especially in an era with the rapid advance of digital and information technologies.

Situating ‘careful surveillance’

2021 ◽  
pp. 136787792199745
Author(s):  
Mark Andrejevic ◽  
Hugh Davies ◽  
Ruth DeSouza ◽  
Larissa Hjorth ◽  
Ingrid Richardson
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Public Space ◽  
Social Care ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Social Distancing ◽  
Health Measures ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship

In this article we explore preliminary findings from the study COVIDSafe and Beyond: Perceptions and Practices conducted in Australia in 2020. The study involved a survey followed by interviews, and aimed to capture the dynamic ways in which members of the Australian public perceive the impact of Covid practices – especially public health measures like the introduction of physical and social distancing, compulsory mask wearing, and contact tracing. In the rescripting of public space, different notions of formal and informal surveillance, along with different textures of mediated and social care, appeared. In this article, we explore perceptions around divergent forms of surveillance across social, technological, governmental modes, and the relationship of surveillance to care in our media and cultural practices. What does it mean to care for self and others during a pandemic? How does care get enacted in, and through, media interfaces and public interaction?

scholarly journals Prevalence of asymptomatic COVID-19 infection using a seroepidemiological survey

2020 ◽  
Vol 148 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Shakiba ◽  
M. Nazemipour ◽  
A. Heidarzadeh ◽  
M. A. Mansournia
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Rapid Test ◽  
Asymptomatic Infection ◽  
Mitigation Strategy ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Health Measures ◽  
Critical Measure ◽  
History Of ◽  
Guilan Province

Abstract The prevalence of asymptomatic infection by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) as a critical measure for effectiveness of mitigation strategy has been reported to be widely varied. In this study, we aimed to determine the prevalence of asymptomatic infection using serosurvey on general population. In a cross-sectional seroprevalence survey in Guilan province, Iran, the specific antibody against COVID-19 in a representative sample was detected using rapid test kits. Among 117 seropositive subjects, prevalence of asymptomatic infection was determined based on the history of symptoms during the preceding 3 months. The design-adjusted prevalence of asymptomatic infection was 57.2% (95% confidence interval (CI) 44–69). The prevalence was significantly lower in subjects with previous contacts to COVID-19 patients (12%, 95% CI 2–49) than others without (69%, 95% CI, 46–86). The lowest prevalence was for painful body symptom (74.4%). This study revealed that more than half of the infected COVID-19 patients had no symptoms. The implications of our findings include the importance of adopting public health measures such as social distancing and inefficiency of contact tracing to interrupt epidemic transmission.

AUTONOMY AND INFORMATIONAL PRIVACY, OR GOSSIP: THE CENTRAL MEANING OF THE FIRST AMENDMENT

2004 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 215-268 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Edwin Baker
Keyword(s):  
Private Information ◽  
Personal Information ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Press Freedom ◽  
Informational Privacy ◽  
The Right To Privacy ◽  
Private Lives ◽  
Central Meaning ◽  
Normative Argument ◽  
The Right

My thesis is simple. The right of informational privacy, the great modern achievement often attributed to the classic Samuel Warren and Louis Brandeis article, “The Right to Privacy” (1890), asserts an individual's right not to have private personal information circulated. Warren and Brandeis claimed that individual dignity in a modern society requires that people be able to keep their private lives to themselves and proposed that the common law should be understood to protect this dignity by making dissemination of private information a tort. As broadly stated, this right not to have private information distributed directly conflicts with a broadly conceived freedom of speech and of the press. My claim is that, in cases of conflict, the law should reject the Warren and Brandeis innovation. Speech and press freedom should prevail; the privacy tort should be ignored. This conclusion requires a normative argument concerning the appropriate basis and status of speech freedom that this essay will not really provide but for which I have argued elsewhere. Here, instead, I will describe that theory of speech freedom, explore its implications for informational privacy, and finally suggest some reasons to think that rejection of the privacy tort should not be so troubling and is, in fact, pragmatically desirable.

scholarly journals Perspective: A National Public Health Workforce to Control COVID-19 and Address Health Disparities in the United States

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter H Kilmarx ◽  
Theodore Long ◽  
Michael J A Reid
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Health Disparities ◽  
Health Workforce ◽  
The United States ◽  
Public Health Workforce ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Future Health ◽  
Health Security ◽  
Long Run

Abstract A large, well-trained public health workforce is needed to control COVID-19 in the United States in the short term and to address other disease burdens and health disparities in the long run. As the public health workforce declined following the 2008 financial crisis, many U.S. jurisdiction struggled to hire a sufficient number staff for roles initially including testing and contact tracing and more recently for vaccination. Ultimately, COVID-19 control will require a combination of vaccination and rapid investigation, contact tracing, and quarantine to stop chains of transmission. New federal resources for a public health workforce have been made available. With appropriate attention to addressing administrative barriers and ensuring equity, a 21 st-century U.S. public health workforce will hasten the control of COVID-19, provide economic relief to individuals and communities, reduce the burden of other infectious diseases, non-communicable diseases, and other disease burdens. A long-term commitment to a robust public health workforce is vital to ensuring health security and preparedness for future health threats.

scholarly journals Ecologies of Public Trust: The NHS COVID-19 Contact Tracing App

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabrielle Samuel ◽  
Frederica Lucivero ◽  
Stephanie Johnson ◽  
Heilien Diedericks
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Public Trust ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Social Phenomenon ◽  
Isle Of Wight ◽  
The Public ◽  
Trust Relationship ◽  
Health Measures ◽  
General Support

AbstractIn April 2020, close to the start of the first U.K. COVID-19 lockdown, the U.K. government announced the development of a COVID-19 contact tracing app, which was later trialled on the U.K. island, the Isle of Wight, in May/June 2020. United Kingdom surveys found general support for the development of such an app, which seemed strongly influenced by public trust. Institutions developing the app were called upon to fulfil the commitment to public trust by acting with trustworthiness. Such calls presuppose that public trust associated with the app can emerge if the conditions for trustworthiness are met and that public trust is simplistic, i.e., linearly the sum of each member of the publics’ individual – U.K. government trust relationship. Drawing on a synthesis of the trust literature and fifteen interviews with members of the public trialling the app on the Isle of Wight, this paper aims to explore what trust mechanisms and relationships are at play when thinking about public trust in the context of the U.K. COVID-19 app. We argue that public trust is a complex social phenomenon and not linearly correlated with institutional trustworthiness. As such, attention needs to widen from calls for trustworthy infrastructures as a way to build public trust, to a deeper understanding of those doing the trusting; in particular, what or whom do people place their trust in (or not) when considering whether using the app and why. An understanding of this will help when trying to secure public trust during the implementation of necessary public health measures.

scholarly journals Know Thine Enemy: Viral Genome Sequencing in Outbreaks

2020 ◽  
pp. 34-37
Author(s):  
Katherine Colvin
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Vaccine Development ◽  
Treatment Options ◽  
Epidemiologic Study ◽  
Latency Period ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Genomic Sequencing ◽  
Remote Communities ◽  
Public Health Response ◽  
Health Measures

CONTAINING a viral outbreak with public health measures firstly requires identification of the causative virus, followed by more detailed understanding of viral features. Genomic sequencing provides exhaustive insight into viral features that may help predict outbreak behaviours, assist in diagnosis and tracking, and shape treatment and vaccination strategies. When coupled with epidemiologic study of outbreak data, viral genomic sequencing can be used to direct public health measures and increase the speed of understanding compared to epidemiology alone. Community spread of cases can be used to guide mathematic models and contact tracing of viral outbreaks for public health response. However, epidemiologic data alone better suits responses to low-prevalence and less-widespread outbreaks. Where pathogens have a longer latency period or spread affects rural and remote communities, features of the virus itself must be considered in determining the response. Genotypic and phenotypic characteristics, identified using molecular biology tools, can clarify the type and strain of a virus responsible for an outbreak, and inform and improve case diagnosis, treatment options, and vaccine development, as well as improve tracing accuracy.1

scholarly journals Evidence for transmission of COVID-19 prior to symptom onset

eLife ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren C Tindale ◽  
Jessica E Stockdale ◽  
Michelle Coombe ◽  
Emma S Garlock ◽  
Wing Yin Venus Lau ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Symptom Onset ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Health Measures ◽  
Serial Interval ◽  
Incubation Periods ◽  
The Mean

We collated contact tracing data from COVID-19 clusters in Singapore and Tianjin, China and estimated the extent of pre-symptomatic transmission by estimating incubation periods and serial intervals. The mean incubation periods accounting for intermediate cases were 4.91 days (95%CI 4.35, 5.69) and 7.54 (95%CI 6.76, 8.56) days for Singapore and Tianjin, respectively. The mean serial interval was 4.17 (95%CI 2.44, 5.89) and 4.31 (95%CI 2.91, 5.72) days (Singapore, Tianjin). The serial intervals are shorter than incubation periods, suggesting that pre-symptomatic transmission may occur in a large proportion of transmission events (0.4–0.5 in Singapore and 0.6–0.8 in Tianjin, in our analysis with intermediate cases, and more without intermediates). Given the evidence for pre-symptomatic transmission, it is vital that even individuals who appear healthy abide by public health measures to control COVID-19.

scholarly journals The emergence of SARS-CoV-2 in Europe and North America

Science ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 370 (6516) ◽  
pp. 564-570 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Worobey ◽  
Jonathan Pekar ◽  
Brendan B. Larsen ◽  
Martha I. Nelson ◽  
Verity Hill ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
United States ◽  
North America ◽  
The United States ◽  
Washington State ◽  
Contact Tracing ◽  
Emerging Viruses ◽  
Transmission Networks ◽  
Health Measures ◽  
Global Spread

Accurate understanding of the global spread of emerging viruses is critical for public health responses and for anticipating and preventing future outbreaks. Here we elucidate when, where, and how the earliest sustained severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) transmission networks became established in Europe and North America. Our results suggest that rapid early interventions successfully prevented early introductions of the virus from taking hold in Germany and the United States. Other, later introductions of the virus from China to both Italy and Washington state, United States, founded the earliest sustained European and North America transmission networks. Our analyses demonstrate the effectiveness of public health measures in preventing onward transmission and show that intensive testing and contact tracing could have prevented SARS-CoV-2 outbreaks from becoming established in these regions.

Protection of Personal Information Act 2013 and data protection for health research in South Africa

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 160-179
Author(s):  
Ciara Staunton ◽  
Rachel Adams ◽  
Dominique Anderson ◽  
Talishiea Croxton ◽  
Dorcas Kamuya ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Data Protection ◽  
Health Research ◽  
Personal Information ◽  
Right To Privacy ◽  
Informational Privacy ◽  
The Right To Privacy ◽  
Constitutional Right ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Impact

Abstract The Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) [No.4 of 2013] is the first comprehensive data protection regulation to be passed in South Africa and it gives effect to the right to informational privacy derived from the constitutional right to privacy It is due to come into force in 2020, and seeks to regulate the processing of personal information in South Africa, regulate the flow of personal information across South Africa’s borders, and ensure that any limitations on the right to privacy are justified and aimed at protecting other important rights and interests. Although it was not drafted with health research in mind, POPIA will have an impact on the sharing of health data for research, in particular biorepositories. It is now timely to consider the impact of POPIA on biorepositories, and the necessary changes to their access and sharing arrangements prior to POPIA coming into force.

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