Your Medical Records at Risk, an article by Robyn E. Blumner, a
columnist, lawyer and director of the Florida ACLU, in the 10/28/96 St.
Petersburg Times:
The Kennedy-Kassebaum health care reform was a great relief to Americans
fearful of losing their health insurance when they change jobs. But a
last-minute addition to the bill might create a new fear - the disclosure of
confidential medical records.
An "Administrative Simplification" section added to the health care bill as it
moved through a congressional conference committee purports to be purely
ministerial, making the collection of health data and information more
efficient. Yet the cost of this new streamlining is the privacy of our most
intimate personal records.
The new law helps to create vast computer files of medical records. It
requires that each of us be issued a "unique health identifier" number.
Thereafter, those numbers would be used for access to any health-related
service.
Although the law does not specifically pre-empt state laws guarding the
confidentiality of medical records, it establishes a committee to review such
privacy protections and supersede those that conflict with information
collection priorities.
A. G. Breitenstein, director of the JRI Health Law Institute, a non-profit
organization providing legal services for people with acquired immune
deficiency syndrome, calls the new law "frightening." She sees the legislation
as particularly insidious because it doesn't mandate the government create new
massive computer information banks. Rather, it sets up the opportunity for
such banks of information to be formed by private companies. The new law is
"greasing the wheels of electronic health data systems," say Breitenstein, in
the same way the "federal standardization of railroad track width" aided the
growth of a national rail system built by private industry.
As a result, few people have paid much attention to it. The legislation
establishes a new standard computerized medical language. Within 18 months of
passage, ALL MEDICAL RECORDS WILL HAVE TO BE STORED using this format.
Breitenstein likens it to a kind of "computerized health data Esperanto." It
will allow private companies to establish huge repositories of health data that
will be instantly available to anyone with access to the system.
The result will be a cottage industry in health information. And, without
proper safeguards, medical records on individuals could be available without
the consent or knowledge of the patient. Imagine how valuable such information
would be to health and life insurance's and potential employers.
-----------------------------------------------------------
TRW Spacecraft Operations East
14320 Sullyfield Circle
Chantilly VA 22021
(703) 802-1863
