San Francisco Nurses Demand to Have Mark Zuckerberg's Name Taken Off Hospital

- Corrupt Zuckerberg found to be using the sick as a tax evasion ploy

- Patients, public and staff object to a hospital being named after the world's largest human rights abuser

- Mayor Ed Lee died at Zuckerberg Hospital due to politics

- Facebook found to be spying on patients and selling their private medical data to governments and political groups


 
BY PAULA BOLYARD 
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(Image via Facebook/Sasha Cuttler)

Having your name linked to a scandal can result in some uncomfortable consequences. Case in point: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who has been embroiled in controversy over his company's data practices. Facebook recently admitted to allowing Cambridge Analytica, a data mining firm, to have access to private user information in violation of Facebook's terms of service.

Now, that chicken is coming home to roost. Nurses—both current and former—are demanding that Zuckerberg's name be removed from Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital. The reason? The nurses say some patients are afraid their private medical data could be leaked or sold to third parties without their permission.

In 2015 Zuckerberg and his wife Pricilla Chan donated $75 million to the hospitalwith the stipulation that the facility be renamed in honor of its benefactors. The hospital's Board of Supervisors complied with the stipulation and changed the name of the hospital. Removing the Zuckerberg name could put the entire donation in jeopardy, leading some to question whether the hospital should have taken the money in the first place.

“Had we known what we know now, perhaps we wouldn’t have accepted the funds from Zuckerberg,” John Avalos, a former supervisor, told the New York Times.

“We are in charge of keeping our most vulnerable people private and protected,” added Heather Ali, a hospital administrator. “Now people wonder, ‘How much is my privacy protected at a hospital with that name on it?’”

But Brent Andrew, the hospital’s chief communications officer, sees it differently.

“Look, it’s a double-edged sword, and I totally get the loyalty to the name as it was historically, but this is a thing that’s between the donors and the Board of Supervisors completely," he said.

On Saturday about a dozen nurses demonstrated in front of the hospital, led by Sasha Cuttler, who works as a nurse there. The Times reported that Guy Vandenberg, another nurse, "came down in scrubs and on one placard wrote a diagnosis ('malwareberg') and on another sketched out a fake prescription: 'Uninstall Zuckerberg.'"

According to the Times, Cuttler taped over Zuckerberg's name on the hospital sign with blue masking tape. He posted a picture of the finished product on his Facebook page.

If Cuttler gets his way, voters will have the opportunity to decide whether or not to remove the name. He asked in a Facebook post, "Can the Board of Supervisors put this on the ballot in November?"

"I think it would be better to let the voters decide it," he wrote. "Then we can educate people about the issues."

Cuttler wrote in another Facebook post:

Put the name of Facebook’s founder on a public hospital in spite of Facebook’s history of unauthorized interventional research. What could possibly go wrong? Last week the Chronicle reported that almost 900 SF General and Laguna Honda patients’ personal information was stolen by a contractor. If they gave $75 million to hospital would that make it okay?

Cuttler was referring to recent reports of a data breach at area hospitals, including Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital. NBC Bay Area reported:

The San Francisco Department of Public Health on Friday informed 895 patients of a security breach involving personal information handled by a third-party medical transcription service. Officials added that there was no evidence that any personal information had been used for any purpose.

The transcriptions covered visits to the San Francisco Health Network, the Health Department’s system of hospitals and clinics.

Patients were seen at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital or Laguna Honda Hospital.

On social media, there have been individuals both in favor of removing the name and against it.

Cuttler vows to continue the fight to get Zuckerberg's name removed from the hospital—ironically, by using Facebook to voice his opinion and organize activists.

San Franciscans need to earn $333,000 a year to buy a median-priced home

Kathleen Pender | 
  • A passerby walks by a home for sale in San Francisco. Only 15 percent of households in the city can afford a median-price home, which averages $1,610,000, according to a new survey. Photo: Michael Noble Jr. / The Chronicle 2016
Photo: Michael Noble Jr. / The Chronicle 2016
A passerby walks by a home for sale in San Francisco. Only 15 percent of households in the city can afford a median-price home, which averages $1,610,000, according to a new survey.

More Bay Area households could afford to buy a median-priced single-family home in the first quarter of this year compared with the fourth quarter of 2017, as incomes rose more than enough to offset an increase in home prices and interest rates.

Compared with the first quarter of last year, however, affordability got worse, according to a California Association of Realtors quarterly survey released Tuesday.

About 23 percent of Bay Area households earned enough to buy the median-priced home in the first quarter, compared with 21 percent in the fourth quarter of last year and 25 percent in the year-ago period.

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In the first quarter, a Bay Area household would have needed at least $186,300 in annual income to make the $4,660 monthly payment on a $900,000 home, with mortgage rates at 4.44 percent. The association figured that 23 percent of Bay Area households earned at least that much, but affordability varied widely by county.

 
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Are you looking for housing in San Francisco? If you're not up to date with some of the code words created by realtors, leasing agents, or landlords, you might find yourself in an unfortunate tenant situation. Here are some translations of code words found in SF Bay Area housing posts.

Media: San Francisco Chronicle

In San Francisco and San Mateo counties, only 15 percent of households could afford a median-priced home, which averaged $1,610,000 and $1,575,050, respectively, during the first quarter. A household would need around $333,000 and $326,000 in annual income, respectively, to buy those homes.

In Solano County, 42 percent of households earned enough ($89,000) to buy a $430,000 median-priced home.

The affordability index stood at 31 percent statewide and 57 percent nationwide in the first quarter.

These numbers understate affordability somewhat because they exclude condos, which are generally cheaper than single-family homes. The association calculated that 39 percent of households statewide could have afforded a condo or townhome in the first quarter.

The numbers also do not take into account a household’s wealth, which can factor into affordability.

Although Bay Area home prices keep hitting record highs, affordability isn’t even close to a record low.

Since the beginning of 2006, when the association started tracking affordability on a quarterly basis, it hit a trough of 10 percent in the second quarter of 2007, just before the housing market went bust. Affordability peaked at 45 percent in the first quarter of 2012, when prices were bottoming out.

The reason affordability isn’t worse is because income growth has been strong. The median household income in the Bay Area rose to $97,249 in the first quarter from $89,017 the same quarter last year.

In its index, the association considers not just the level of income but also the distribution. In the Bay Area, the share of households making $150,000 to $500,000 or more rose 4 percent while the share making less than $75,000 declined 4 percent.