PRIVACY MATTERS
with Meaghan McCluskey
ALL ABOUT
CONSENT
For companies looking to develop a pandemic plan, collecting vital information from
employees should be performed with great caution
S
ick days are common to any work- formation and Privacy Commissioner of to assess how many employees may need
place. However, as those long winter Alberta released a report entitled, “Privacy to be absent to care for sick dependants,
days continue and flu season creeps in the Time of a Pandemic: Guidance for the Commissioner’s report notes that for
up upon us, more employees are going to Organizations.”) the purposes of statistics, this information
be staying home sick. When it comes to pandemic planning could be collected in the form of anony-
Managing sick employees and contin- and dealing with sick employees, private mous surveys to avoid collecting unneces-
gency plans for pandemic levels of ab- sector privacy laws apply in the normal sary identifiable information. Also, if the
senteeism creates several challenges, way during non-emergency times, and information will be used to estimate what
including what employee information can generally require that the collection of per- percentage of the work force has depen-
be collected and used in creating pan- sonal information from employees be rea- dants, the raw data could be destroyed
demic plans, what information can be col- sonable and the minimum necessary to once these statistics are calculated.
lected and used when dealing with sick fulfill the purposes. For example, when col- Employers may also wish to know if
employees, and how sick employees can lecting information for the purpose of pan- their employees may be at higher risk of
work remotely in a secure manner. (Note: demic planning, consent should be falling ill with the flu. Employers should be
In October 2009, the Office of the Privacy obtained from employees prior to collec- cautious in this circumstance as their col-
Commissioner of Canada, the Office of the tion by informing them of the purposes of lection of personal information must
Information and Privacy Commissioner for the collection and how long the informa- be only the minimum necessary to meet
British Columbia and the Office of the In- tion will be retained. If the employer wishes their purposes. The Commissioner’s
10 SECURITY MATTERS JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2010
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