International Coalition Calls for COVID-19 Whistleblower Protection
With the world’s health at stake, medics, support staff and reporters are facing threats for trying to bring accurate information on the ongoing pandemic to a concerned public. In light of the vital importance of whistleblowers in the current crisis, the Coalition to Make Whistleblowing Safe During COVID-19 and Beyond has written an open letter calling on all public authorities and institutions to protect those who report or expose harms, abuses and serious wrongdoing.
The coalition of more than 100 groups is made up institutions including trade unions, journalism organizations, universities, whistleblower support groups, academics and activists. Their number includes Melbourne and Berlin-based Blueprint for Free Speech and its subsidiary, Blueprint Greece, plus Transparency International and its branches in Australia, Estonia, Greece, Ireland, and Italy.
The group is concerned that the assumption of emergency powers during the crisis could be used by authoritarian leaders to pursue journalists for reporting cases that they would have preferred to remain concealed. Many fear that the assumption of emergency powers in Hungary could be used as a pretext for further action against a beleaguered independent media sector. The use of population-level phone surveillance and digital contact tracing presents potential dangers for journalists and the whistleblowers they depend on in many countries, if these systems are not designed and implemented with privacy in mind.
Whistleblowers are also being targeted directly, including nurses and doctors facing workplace disciplinary action after warning of shortages of personal protective equipment. Prominent cases of workplace retaliation have been publicised in the US and the UK. The best known case of all is that of China’s Dr. Li Wenliang, who was reprimanded by local authorities for “spreading rumours” after he sought to warn Chinese colleagues about the emergence of COVID-19. He became one of the first whistleblowers warning about the virus. Higher levels of the Chinese Government took a different approach, and he was eventually exonerated. Tragically, he contracted the disease and eventually died from it.
COVID-19 whistleblowing has not been restricted to the healthcare sector. In one of the most high-profile cases of employer retaliation, Captain Brett Crozier was relieved of his command of the USS Roosevelt in the Pacific for allegedly showing “extremely poor judgment” by sending out a memo about COVID-19 infection spreading. He sought help from the Navy to protect his crew through a plan to safely remove most crew members from the ship. More than 100 people on the crew of 4800 sailors had tested positive for the disease. The ship was described by the media as a ‘petri dish’ of infection.
In a clip that was widely shared on social media, Crozier’s departure from USS Roosevelt was accompanied by the very vocal support of his 4,800-person crew. A few days later, it was confirmed that Crozier himself was suffering from the virus. He had to go into quarantine.
Reaping the costs of corruption
The COVID-19 pandemic also puts the long-term impact of corruption into sharp relief. Greece closed non-essential businesses and put its population into lockdown relatively early in the course of its own epidemic, which has allowed it to hold down the number of cases and fatalities. But maintaining public confidence has been challenging in the aftermath of as series of corruption scandals in the health care sector, which have including doctors accepting bribes for operating on patients.
That legacy has played into worries about potential corruption in the acquisition of essential equipment and profiteering over the virus with governments frantically seeking everything from masks to gloves to ventilators for hospitals and clinics.
This is recognised in the Coalition statement. “Fairness, transparency and cooperation are vital and never more so than during a pandemic. We have already seen examples of wrongdoing and mismanagement in our public institutions, commercial markets and business as a result of COVID-19.”
“During this pandemic we have already witnessed abuses. At various times, the fundamental rights of freedom of expression and access to information have been restricted.”
The group added: “Whistleblowing has proven to be a powerful tool to fight and prevent actions that undermine the public interest. Our organizations call on all public authorities and corporate institutions to protect those who expose harms, abuses and serious wrongdoing during the COVID-19 crisis, and beyond.
Read the full statement with the list of signatories here.