Never has public trust in health authorities been so important yet so fragile. In the UK, the NHS is carrying out the biggest vaccination drive in its history to inoculate millions from COVID-19. However, decades of marginalisation have left Black, Asian and migrant communities more reluctant to be vaccinated.
We’ve seen how quickly a lack of transparency can lead to people turning their backs on public health initiatives in the past. When, in 2014, the NHS proposed expanding the data it collects on patients for research purposes, the project quickly soured because of opaque communication and failures to gain consent.
In this context, the UK government’s murky deal with tech giant Palantir is a terrible misstep. With faith in Silicon Valley leaders at an all-time low, and a public more wary than ever of their data privacy, ministers have chosen to extend a data-sharing deal with a beast of online surveillance under the least scrutiny possible.
