Do Ailing CEOs of Publicly Traded Firms Have a Right to Medical Privacy?

Jan 19th, 2009 • Posted in: News

Apple’s chief takes a medical leave after months of denial that his health is declining; many feel that because he is so closely linked with the firm’s creative vision, Steve Jobs should be required to release more information

NEW YORK
Speculation about the health of Apple CEO Steve Jobs has raised ethics questions about whether the heads of publicly traded firms have a right to medical privacy.

CNBC reports that the issue is on the minds of many investors after Apple announced that Jobs will take a leave of absence until the end of June due to heath problems “more complex” than originally thought.

Writes CNBC’s Lee Brodie: “Jobs, a pancreatic cancer survivor, dropped his bombshell in a cryptic announcement on Wednesday — only nine days after he soothed jumpy investors somewhat by saying his dramatic weight loss over the past seven months was due to an easily treatable hormone imbalance. He had promised to remain at the helm throughout his treatment.”

For several months, Apple insisted that Jobs’s health was a private matter with no impact on the firm, releasing little information, reports CNET.

While there are no hard-and-fast legal guidelines about disclosing CEO health, CNET’s Steven Musil maintains that any health issue affecting a CEO’s ability to run the company needs to be disclosed to the board of directors and the public.

The problem at Apple, reports ABC News, is that Jobs is closely associated with Apple’s creative vision. His announcement in the last week sent the company’s stock down several points.

Kirk Hanson, at ethicist at California’s Santa Clara University, tells ABC that Jobs is a unique CEO, arguing that “his health affects the interest of so many other people that he gives up some of his right to privacy.”

Jobs’s health has captured media attention partly because Apple has been coy about releasing information, says Fortune senior editor Roger Parloff. “The Apple board appears to have consistently bowed to Steve Jobs’ desire to keep his health issues private. Accordingly, the board has kept investors informed about these matters — to paraphrase a line from the play A Thousand Clowns – primarily by means of rumor. Some have argued that the board’s conduct has actually been illegal or, if it isn’t, ought to be made so in the future,” Parloff writes.

Sources: CNN/Fortune, Jan. 16 — CNBC, Jan. 16 — CNET, Jan. 16 — ABC News, Jan. 16.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Nov. 3, 2008 — Related Newsline story, Oct. 14, 2008 — Related Newsline story, Aug. 4, 2008 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 16, 2007 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 2, 2007.

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1. Ethics Newsline® » News » Scientists Using Own Children as Research Subjects: Report on January 26th, 2009 at 7:25 pm:

   [...] more information, see: Related Newsline story, Jan. 19 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 19 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 22, [...]

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