Durham District School Board Accidentally Emailed Out Who's Unvaccinated On Their Team

It's hard to take back what you send as soon as you fire off that text or email, and the Durham District School Board is learning that the hard way.

The DDSB apologized for "inadvertently" emailing the vaccine statuses of their unvaccinated and undisclosed staff members to almost 400 people.

In what should have been a routine email about rapid test compliance, a spokesperson for DDSB Communications and Public Relations told Narcity that a spreadsheet containing the names of their approximately 800 "unvaccinated/prefer not to disclose" staff was "inadvertently attached".

About 399 DDSB employees from that "unvaccinated/prefer not to disclose" category were on the receiving end of the email, which was sent out on January 5.

"Once we realized this, we took action to delete all of the emails from the recipients' inboxes," DDSB's comms team added.

"This incident should not have happened, and we have notified, apologized to and followed-up with the approximately 800 employees that were impacted. The DDSB takes our responsibility to protect the personal information of all employees very seriously and we sincerely regret that this incident occurred."

According to the DDSB, any employee who is unvaccinated or who chooses not to disclose their information can still work but is required to take two rapid antigen tests each week. They have to attend an educational session about the benefits of COVID-19 vaccines, too.

So far, 95% of their permanent staff and trustees are fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

Starting January 17, all of Ontario's students will be going back to school where they will resume in-person classes.

Minister of Education Stephen Lecce and Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Kieran Moore are set to provide an update about next week's return to in-person learning today at 1:30 p.m.

Health Canada has a robust website with all the latest information on COVID-19 vaccines and can answer any questions you may have.

This article's cover image was used for illustrative purposes only.