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Heather Mallick: Are businesses worth more than human lives? In Doug Ford’s Ontario, the answer is yes

Aug 25, 2021 , , , , by shlf

Thanks largely to Premier Doug Ford’s intransigence, Ontario COVID-19 cases are rising so fast that a moral catastrophe threatens, prefaced by a series of shocks. It’s not just that , a frightening number, but that it will trend far higher than hospitals’ capacity to care for patients.

As the Star has reported, within two weeks hospital intensive care units will likely see 150 COVID-19 patients, which means that non-emergency surgery for people with cancer, heart and other conditions will have to be delayed again. The backlog from the last delayed surgeries will not clear. It will build.

The modelling suggests there will be “at least 400 such patients requiring intensive care, which is above the level of 350 where officials have previously warned it becomes ‘virtually impossible’ to perform non-emergency surgeries.”

People will die because of these delays. Just as families were heartbroken by not being at a loved one’s side before or at the point of death, families will suffer even more not knowing if a stricken relative could have been saved. Their bitterness and sorrow will be extreme.

But another shock could follow. If hospitals are overrun with cases, they will have to ration care, judging which patients will get possibly life-saving care and which will be left to die. Normally, according to the rules of triage, the sickest patients are treated first.

With intensive care units overwhelmed, triage might change. A very ill patient might be advised to accept death while a younger or less stricken patient might still have a chance.

Here’s where the real pain begins: a patient might have COVID-19 because they had fewer life chances in the first place. They were poor, ill-nourished, unable to speak English well, worked in a public-facing job or a careless workplace. Or they might just be a bad bet because of age or mental health or other factors that were impossible to alter.

When people begin to die for that reason, families do not get over it. That’s when the rage begins, a permanent anger at inbuilt unfairness, at a government that thought a business’s health was worth more than human health. The obvious answer is to pay businesses to stay closed in a lockdown that lasts long enough to hack at terrible rates of illness.

This is not the Progressive Conservative government’s way, so much so that it initially quietly altered the numbers provided by science to the number preferred by the government. , Public Health Ontario had provided numbers for the threshold at which “red” control, the second-highest level of restrictions, would kick in. They were 25 cases per 100,000 people and a lab test positivity rate of 2.5 per cent.

. On Friday it backed down after public furor and set the numbers at 40 cases per 100,000 with a positivity rate over 2.5 per cent, placing Toronto, Hamilton and other regions in the red control zone. If it weren’t for good journalism …

, overseen by an ethics committee from a government agency, suggested that in the worst case emergency, those with less than a 75 per cent chance of survival should be denied medication and care by ventilator.

If that is untenable, many more . Is quality of life considered? Should it be? Would people be asked to volunteer, and could they feel pressured?

Here’s the most shocking part, which will arrive perhaps next year. All this terrible fear and pain is a rehearsal for what happens when a successful vaccine arrives. Who will get it first? Presumably health-care workers and those, like the elderly and ill, who are already more vulnerable to COVID-19.

But after that, the classifications become more difficult. If there aren’t enough vaccines — people in Toronto have found even flu vaccines difficult to obtain — how will they be distributed?

I assume it will be done fairly badly, given that it is almost impossible to do well. No decision will please everyone, or even smaller cohorts. The anger people will feel as they see others get the vaccine ahead of them will be extraordinary. What is worrying is that the rage might be permanent.

It will leave some people forever free from goodwill. Look at the anti-maskers, furious over a wee, temporary, harmless bit of cloth. See unmasked men glaring on the Toronto subway, itching to start a fight.

How will they feel when they finally realize that death is stepping into the bright light, and making its choices? I say “feel” because they won’t think. They will lash out against logic, science and moral codes.

Life ends. If we all rage against the dying of the light, imagine the rage against those whose light will not die, while yours very likely will.

Times like these might cause mass resentment and moral disintegration in a once-civil society. Next year will test us sorely.

Heather Mallick is a Toronto-based columnist covering current affairs for the Star. Follow her on Twitter:

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How do tech giants like Google and Facebook get and use your personal data?

Jul 23, 2021 , , , , by shlf

It’s no secret that Facebook and Google have been dominating the digital ad sphere for quite some time.

Their success, in large part, comes from the tech giants’ ability to monetize their users, collecting information about their likes and dislikes, and targeting them with ads.

But how is this done, and to what extent? How can Canadians control the amount of personal information that is out there for public use?

Privacy experts Michael Geist, a professor from University of Ottawa who specializes in technology law, and Andrew Clement, professor emeritus and faculty of information co-ordinator at University of Toronto, weigh in on the platforms and how they collect and use personal data.

HOW DO FACEBOOK AND GOOGLE OBTAIN PERSONAL DATA?

The first thing, Geist noted, is that these platforms both operate on different models.

In the case of Facebook, he said, much of the information is supplied to the company directly by users who typically consent to this as part of a user agreement.

“As you engage in certain activities on the platform, Facebook is able to see that and both rely on the information you directly provided and develop inferences based on what kind of activity you engage in,” he said. “So once you’ve consented to that kind of information or provided it directly, Facebook has access to it.”

As well, Clement said, third parties providing apps and services through Facebook are able to access users’ personal information, as was demonstrated in the 2016 Cambridge Analytica scandal, through which the data agency used Facebook to try to shape political opinions ahead of the U.S. election.

When it comes to Google, data collection works a little bit differently, Clement said.

Unlike Facebook, Google doesn’t have certain abilities such as seeing what you “like” or who your friends are, however, users who are logged into Google through a Gmail account, will give the platform more specific information about themselves.

“There’s nobody necessarily reading your emails, but (Google) is using their analytic techniques to put you into categories, which then become the basis as to how they sell your attention to advertisers,” he said.

Clement added that another notable source of information for Google is via Google Maps.

“If you have that app … they’re getting a constant stream of information about where you are,” he said.

WHAT IS THE DATA COLLECTION PRIMARILY USED FOR?

The primary motive of data collection by Facebook and Google is to target users with relevant ads, Geist said.

He added that there is often misinformation that circulates about tech giants selling users’ information to third parties who then create lists and target those users themselves.

“Facebook is not interested in selling that information; they’re interested in using that information as an edge to generate more accurate ads,” he said. “The information they have about their users, much of it supplied by the users themselves — that’s their secret sauce. That’s how they are able to provide a more compelling ad product.”

HOW IS THIS PROBLEMATIC?

“I think it hits home that your activities are being captured,” Geist said. “Now, there are billions of users, so they’re not interested in you per se, but they want to know about you to provide that information and certainly there’s, I think, a creep factor associated with it.”

Clement argued that the problem stems far beyond the creep factor.

“They monetize your personal information by using that to predict and shape your behaviour and that is extremely dangerous,” he said.

WHAT CAN YOU DO ABOUT IT?

First and foremost, users shouldn’t be sharing information that they’re not comfortable with being used, Geist said. “If you share it, it is likely to be used. It may not affect you directly but you should know that that’s the reality,” he said.

Clement agreed.

“Think about what you post and look for alternatives and don’t assume that it’s all benign if you just leave it with these companies,” he advised.

Big tech users should also be aware of their privacy options while using these platforms on a regular basis.

“For users that haven’t taken the time to take a look at the privacy tools that are offered by these companies to allow them to shape some of those choices, they ought to do so, because in the broad world of data that could be collected, it’s a pretty wide range of stuff,” Geist added.

Something as simple as logging out of Gmail is a good way to prevent Google from identifying a specific user on the search engine, for example.

HOW CAN THESE MODELS BE CHANGED IN THE FUTURE?

Clement said one possibility would be to scale back tech giants to allow users to continue to enjoy the benefits of social media through some other form of payment that wouldn’t allow for the monetization of personal information.

And while these tech companies are large players when it comes to personal data collection, citizens should note that they are not the only ones. Companies and governments, too, have information about you.