Excerpts from the ChicagoTribune.com:
Cook County Board commissioners voted 9-7 with one member abstaining from a resolution which would direct the Cook County Department of Public Health to disclose locations of those testing positive for the coronavirus with 911 dispatchers in suburban Cook County every day for two months.
While the measure is only a recommendation, the Cook County Department of Public Health will follow the address-sharing practice because of the board’s instructions. That’s in spite of the public health co-administrator’s warning before the vote that the practice was inadequate and dangerous for both citizens and
first respondersemergency personnel.The county board president said that it guaranteed the address-sharing plan would contribute to the systemic racism that black and Latino communities suffer. One commissioner said the resolution could backfire, as there are scores of residents who may have not sought testing because they are asymptomatic and that every individual that law enforcement comes into contact with should be treated as a COVID-19-positive case. Her position was supported by the Illinois Department of Public Health.
The measure comes after a legal challenge to instate address-sharing was shot down. Earlier this month, a northwest suburban 911 dispatch system failed in its bid to force Cook County to share addresses of coronavirus patients on Friday after a judge denied its temporary restraining order. But the judge did grant the Village of Lincolnwood’s motion to intervene and set another hearing for early June.
The Illinois attorney general advised that address-sharing is permissible due to a Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) exception, but he did not go so far as to recommend the practice.
Much of the Thursday board meeting’s public comment section was centered around the resolution, with suburban villages, police departments, and fire departments urging the need for address-sharing amid PPE shortages, and dozens of individuals and civil rights groups, including the Illinois chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, saying it would lead to harm.
The board also took the opportunity to censure President Donald Trump’s administration for what they described as a failure to deliver enough PPE for
first respondersemergency personnel that they said led them to the controversial address-sharing proposal.
