University investigation finds ‘no merit’ to allegations officials suppressed access to Florida COVID data

The College of Florida has accomplished an investigation into claims that college or state officers used stress to destroy or forestall entry to state COVID-19 information, discovering that the allegations had been meritless.

The investigation, carried out by the varsity’s Workplace of the Vice President for Analysis and the Workplace of Compliance and Ethics, was launched after a December 2021 report from the UF School Senate Advert Hoc Committee on Educational Freedom. That report alleged that researchers at UF’s Gainesville campus felt exterior stress to destroy information and confronted “limitations” to accessing, analyzing and publishing their findings.

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“Upon finishing its investigation, the committee discovered no advantage to the allegations concerning the dealing with of COVID-19 information at UF,” the investigation’s leaders — Vice President for Analysis David Norton and Chief Compliance, Ethics and Privateness Officer Terra DeBois — mentioned in a letter to high school President Kent Fuchs.

The letter mentioned that the investigation included interviews and critiques of assorted paperwork which led the investigation committee to imagine that the accusations had been seemingly primarily based on an October 2020 incident the place a Florida Division of Well being consultant “expressed issues concerning UF’s use and administration of FDOH information that was gathered completely to be used in FDOH public well being surveillance (PHS) actions.”

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The varsity officers elaborated, explaining that in the summertime of 2020 the FDOH employed college workers to assist conduct surveillance for contact tracing functions and that this included granting them entry to FDOH information and having them signal a confidentiality settlement. That October, a few of the faculty workers shared a few of that data at a Zoom assembly, the place a few of the different members had been FDOH representatives. In response to the college, CDC representatives had been additionally within the assembly.

“These UF workers didn’t have the authority to share the information or use them for analysis functions,” the letter mentioned. “In response, the UF crew was reminded by college directors to be cognizant of the boundaries and restrictions associated to the use and assortment of FDOH information.”

Fox Information reached out to FDOH and a consultant for Gov. Ron DeSantis for remark however they didn’t instantly reply.

DeSantis press secretary Christina Pushaw responded to the investigation’s findings by taking a shot at reporters who repeated the allegations.

“Let me guess, all of the churnalists who wrote these breathless headlines final summer season repeating proof free allegations in opposition to @govrondesantis will apologize now. Simply kidding, they may fake this by no means occurred,” Pushaw tweeted.