Tag Archives: Privacy

Privacy in a Pandemic

Case Study, , , , ,

http://www.unothegateway.com image

By Casey Bukro

Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists

The Covid-19 pandemic commanded the world’s attention, straining medical resources and testing the media’s competence to understand and accurately report such an unprecedented event. 

As often happens in major events, journalists try to tell the story by describing what is happening to individuals. They try to “humanize” the story to describe the suffering of patients and brave attempts by doctors and nurses to treat the highly communicable disease, which struck down caregivers.

The death toll was one of the highest in pandemic history. The World Health Organization reports 7 million coronavirus deaths worldwide, from Dec. 31, 2019 to Feb. 4, 2024. With 1.2 million deaths, the United States had more covid casualties than any nation, despite having one of the most advanced health care systems in the world. Brazil was next with 702,000 deaths, followed by India with 533,500.

A horrifying story

It was a dramatic and horrifying story. And one that tested the ethical conduct of journalists. Although their intentions were good, did some of them go too far?

A British Broadcasting Corporation reporter based in Ho Chi Minh City contacted AdviceLine asking: “Should journalists enter an operating room where doctors are rescuing a critical patient just to have a good story?” Doctors consented to a story, with photos, in a hospital in Vietnam. But did their actions “undermine the patient’s privacy?”

The BBC reporter said the patient, an airline pilot, gained notoriety because his case was considered so rare in severity, “every minute detail of his recovery was reported in national newspapers and on TV news bulletins.”

Patient privacy

The case raises questions dealing with a patient’s privacy rights, and how much the public needs to know in a global public health crisis.

The AdviceLine adviser in this case was Joseph Mathewson, who teaches journalism law and ethics at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, Media & Integrated Marketing Communications.

Mathewson first turned to BBC editorial guidelines on privacy, which state: “We must be able to demonstrate why an infringement of privacy is justified, and, when using the public interest to justify an infringement, consideration should be given to proportionality; the greater the intrusion, the greater the public interest required to justify it.”

Guidelines

The guidelines went on to say: “We must be able to justify an infringement of an individual’s privacy without their consent by demonstrating that the intrusion is outweighed by the public interest…. We must balance the public interest in the full and accurate reporting of stories involving human suffering and distress with an individual’s privacy and respect for their human dignity.”

In this case, it was not known if the patient consented to be interviewed and photographed. Without consent, said Mathewson, “the journalist then needs to weigh the public interest in that infringement to determine whether it was warranted.”

Broadcasting code

The United Kingdom also has a broadcasting code with similar restrictions that take public interest into account, adding: “Examples of public interest would include revealing or detecting crime, protecting public health or safety, exposing misleading claims made by individuals or organizations or disclosing incompetence that affects the public.”

Mathewson observed that the many stories written about the patient probably identified him to some degree. “I can’t help wondering what was in the many previous stories about him,” he told the BBC reporter.

If previous stories, done without his consent, had identified the patient and his employer, “the ethics analysis might be different,” said Mathewson.

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The Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists was founded in 2001 by the Chicago Headline Club (Chicago professional chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists) and Loyola University Chicago Center for Ethics and Social Justice. It partnered with the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University in 2013. It is a free service.

Professional journalists are invited to contact the Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists for guidance on ethics. Call 866-DILEMMA or ethicsadvicelineforjournalists.org.

Sparing the Victim

Case Study

loudonnow.com image

By Casey Bukro

Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists

Ethical journalism involves more than what you report; it’s also about what you decide to leave out.

The Loudoun Times-Mirror set a good example of that by deciding against naming the parents of a high school sexual assault victim, and refusing to follow the example of other media that did.

The assault occurred in the bathroom of a Loudoun high school, allegedly by a person charged in a separate assault at a second school.

“By using the names of the parents, the original reporting indirectly identified a teen sexual assault victim,” said the newspaper in an editorial. This violated the newspaper’s policy against identifying victims of sexual assault, and was an invasion of the victim’s privacy.

The Loudoun Times-Mirror should be applauded for its sensitivity toward the victim. The Society of Professional Journalists code of ethics says, under a section on minimizing harm: “Show compassion for those who may be affected by news coverage. Use heightened sensitivity when dealing with juveniles, victims of sex crimes and sources or subjects who are inexperienced or unable to give consent.”

The weekly newspaper is based in Leesburg, Virginia, covering news in the area for more than two centuries, says its website.

The Loudoun Times-Mirror editorial went on to say: “The matter was complicated for us when the story was picked up by myriad national and international news outlets, many, if not all of which named the victim’s parents.” The newspaper acknowledged a long history of media abandoning efforts to protect the identity of victims once others have identified them.

The Loudoun Times-Mirror decided to ignore that practice, for which it also should be applauded. Ethics is a matter of coming to your own decisions about what is correct and ethical. Simply doing what others do is copycat journalism, letting others make decisions for you.

The editorial continued:

“In the end if came down to this: While Loudoun has seemingly been under the unrelenting gaze of the national media recently, those organizations don’t have the same ties to this community as we do. These pages are tossed in the driveways of the victim’s peers, and that’s not something we take for granted. If the decision to not name the parents in our reporting can preserve even a modicum of privacy for a person who has endured such a reprehensible crime at such a young age, then that’s a choice we can live with.”

That’s a good choice.

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The Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists was founded in 2001 by the Chicago Headline Club (Chicago professional chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists) and Loyola University Chicago Center for Ethics and Social Justice. It partnered with the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University in 2013. It is a free service.

Professional journalists are invited to contact the Ethics AdviceLine for Journalists for guidance on ethics. Call 866-DILEMMA or ethicsadvicelineforjournalists.org.

Right To Be Forgotten

Accountability, Accuracy, Fairness, Freedom of Speech, Media, Minimizing Harm, Privacy, Social Media, , , ,

Right to be forgotten: Chava Gourarie writes about two British men who sued to keep their past crimes out of Google search results.

“As the first case to test the ‘right to be forgotten’ in England’s High Court, its outcome will likely set some ground rules in the roiling debate between personal privacy and freedom of expression on the internet,” she writes.