COVID-19: How to Process Employees’ Health Data

With lockdown measures easing, many businesses are preparing for their employees’ return to the workplace. However, with the risk of COVID-19 transmission between colleagues, what data can employers legitimately use to mitigate the risk? What should happen to the data afterwards? Can employers take temperature checks or ask health related questions without breaching the GDPR? What are the alternatives to relying on explicit consent? What if staff refuse to allow screening to take place? What about using customer data to assist with track and trace schemes?

Our employment and data privacy law experts Piers Leigh-Pollitt and Mike Hibberd guide employers through the thorny questions arising with health data in light of COVID-19.

Areas they look at include:

• Why is health data treated differently to other types of data?
• Are employers allowed to process such data?
• What written records must be kept?
• Can employers screen their staff and ask health related questions?
• For businesses with many visitors (such as pubs and restaurants) how should they collect visitor data and what can they do with it?
• What guidance is available from the data privacy watchdog, the ICO?

The information given in this webinar on 4 August 2020 is for reference purposes only. It does not constitute legal advice and should not be relied upon as such. Specific legal advice about your own circumstances should always be sought separately before taking any action.