A group of students at Western University in London, ON, are taking legal action against the school for imposing a COVID-19 booster requirement weeks before the fall semester began. .“You are inexplicably mandating a blanket medical treatment without any consideration of individual risk factors, natural immunity, or the ethics (or lack thereof) of coercing injections to receive educational services,” said Libertas Law lawyer Lisa Bildy in a demand letter. .“This is unconscionable.” .Western announced August 22 students and staff are required to have taken a COVID-19 booster shot to come to campus, and they will have to be masked in classrooms and seminar rooms. .READ MORE: Ontario university enacts COVID-19 booster mandate, reinstates mask requirement.“While we can’t predict when the next wave of COVID-19 might come, we believe these measures will help us protect the in-person experience that Western is known for,” said Western Provost and Vice-president, Academic Florentine Strzelczyk. .“We want to do everything we can to offer our students a great on-campus experience throughout the academic year.” .While there are numerous causes of action exposing Western’s COVID-19 booster policy to liability — and which Bildy’s clients might choose to pursue in the future if it is not rescinded — she said they'll be initiating a lawsuit about privacy breaches now. .Bildy said the university does not have authority under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA) or the Personal Health Information Protection Act (PHIPA) to gather data about people’s vaccine status. .Bildy went on to say none of the exceptions for collecting personal information under FIPPA apply to Western’s booster mandate. She added the university cannot enact this policy under PHIPA because the institution would not be classified as a health information custodian. .A health information custodian is defined under Section 3 of PHIPA as healthcare facilities such as hospitals, long-term care homes, and pharmacies. Bildy said the act would not apply to a university surveying students and staff about whether or not they have been vaccinated, as it is not providing healthcare to them. .The lawyer said PHIPA is not an authorizing statute and the act does not empower institutions to demand medical information FIPPA prohibits them from collecting. .While it might have been arguable last fall, Bildy said collecting this information could have been justified under the Reopening Ontario Act, which has now been revoked and the state of emergency lifted..A court ruling about the COVID-19 vaccine mandate at the University of Guelph determined the details Western is aiming to collect constitutes personal information and can be protected. .Bildy said her clients will not be providing Western their vaccine status. She called the university’s request “none of your business.” .Given the approaching deadline to be boosted and the harms students and staff could face for not complying, she said she is preparing an application to the Ontario Superior Court of Justice for her clients requesting the policy be struck down. Bildy's clients will be seeking an interim injunction stopping the collection of people’s vaccine status until the application can be heard..“The matter can be resolved short of litigation by amending the Policy to merely recommend the booster shot and leaving the ultimate decision for individual consideration, as most of the world is now doing,” she said..“We trust you will govern yourselves accordingly.” .Former Western ethics professor and The Democracy Fund (TDF) ethics scholar Julie Ponesse condemned her ex-employer for enacting the booster policy and mask mandate on Thursday, calling it “unscientific.” .READ MORE: Cancelled Western professor speaks out against university’s COVID-19 restrictions.“If they did intend to do it all along, they should have been very clear to students all along, so that students were able to make a fully informed choice whether or not enrolling in the fall was something they wanted to do,” said Ponesse. .TDF sent a letter to the university objecting to the booster mandate, saying it is unconstitutional and requesting it be modified or rescinded. It will be offering legal information to post-secondary students and staff facing the mandates.
