This debate is not new, and democracies have recently had to painfully grapple with this issue when they were hit by terrorism.
The freedom of movement is logically the first to be challenged in the fight against the pandemic, and the limits of international borders were quickly substituted by those of our departments classified as green or red according to health criteria, thus granting everyone the freedom to move with changing geography.
In the name of health security, another freedom has been challenged, that of respect for privacy. It is notably on this principle that medical confidentiality is founded. While it is necessary to collect anonymous medical data to better understand the disease and fight it effectively, it seems unacceptable that our rights are contingent upon whether or not we are afflicted by a disease, and that everyone’s illness could be known to all.
This issue has already arisen concerning HIV and the danger of contaminating an unsuspecting partner. France, like most countries, then chose to respect medical confidentiality and to hold patients accountable. This is the same path we must take in the current COVID-19 health crisis if we want to be both effective and respectful of ethics and everyone’s privacy.
Finally, in these particular circumstances, we see two attempts emerging to limit the expression of thought or opinions. One seeks to eradicate false information at the risk of validating only the “official word,” while the other attempts to eliminate violence on social networks, thus challenging the “freedom to criticize,” a fundamental principle of our democracies.
We must accept, with lucidity and caution, to temporarily shift the balance toward security when this principle of protection of life conflicts with that of protecting our freedoms. However, let us be wary of permanently forsaking the essential under the pressure of urgency and fear, because as Edgard Morin highlights, “In sacrificing the essential to urgency, one ends up forgetting the urgency of the essential.”
We can win the health battle without abandoning the fragile principles of democracy and an efficient and protective medicine for individuals.
Jean LEONETTI, Mayor of Antibes, President of CASA
