Bush Acts to Drop Core Privacy Rule on Medical Data: This is an outrage. Read the proposal, formulate your own opinion and find a way to act during the thirty-day period for public comments. While the dysadministration says its concern is for patient care, it seems to me this move has a multifold motive, and none of them are for the good of the patient.

First, it is consistent with Shrub’s ideological battle against privacy as an end in itself. By basing his decision on worst-case scenarios in which upholding privacy rights could have an adverse impact on quality or rapidity of care, he says civil rights are only useful if they are means to an end. Calling his position ‘common sense’ implies that consumer advocates’ principles are nonsense. Second, he continues to dismantle Clinton achievements on principle as an ideological slap in the face to constituents of the Democratic administration. Thirdly, this is another giveaway to big business — in this case, the healthcare industry — at the expense of the rest of us, allowing insurance companies less fettered access to patient information for purposes not of patient care but reimbursement — to improve their cash flow. Finally, it clearly is an ideological tool to further his anti-abortion and pro-family fundamentalist agenda.

Believe me, patient care would not be significantly compromised by patients having to sign another form; there are already massive paperwork transactions involved in any healthcare encounter, and one more consent form will be dealt with as automatically as the rest. From the inside, I can tell you that healthcare facilities have easily taken in stride preparing for the Clinton privacy provisions, and efficient policies and procedures for complying are in place. But the potential for misuse of patents’ medical data if it is not strictly protected are rampant. NY Times