Watch me take the liberal side - Privacy laws.

[FromTheSouth]

From this article at Foxnews.com

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/200...tient-privacy-critics-charge/?test=latestnews

New Oklahoma Abortion Law Violates Patient Privacy, Critics Charge
The Statistical Reporting of Abortions Act has outraged a number of abortion rights advocates who say it is a blatant violation of patient privacy rights that is meant to intimidate women from seeking abortions.

By Cristina Corbin

FOXNews.com

Tuesday, October 20, 2009


Abortion rights advocates are lashing out at a new law in Oklahoma that in less than two weeks will require doctors to release detailed information -- which will be posted on a public Web site -- about all women who have abortions in the state.

The law, which will take effect on Nov. 1, compels the Oklahoma Department of Health to publish data online on all abortion patients -- including the woman's race, marital status, financial circumstances, years of education, number of previous pregnancies, and her reason for seeking the abortion. Doctors who fail to provide such information will be criminally penalized and stripped of their medical licenses.

The Statistical Reporting of Abortions Act has outraged many abortion rights activists who say it is a blatant violation of patient privacy rights and is meant to intimidate women from seeking abortions. The law also prohibits the use of abortion for sex-selection.

"The law itself is contrary to our Constitution," said Lora Joyce Davis, an Oklahoma resident who, along with former state Rep. Wanda Jo Stapleton, has filed a lawsuit over the measure.

The law does not permit women's names to be posted, but it does require them to provide answers to 37 questions -- including the county where the abortion is performed. Davis, who is working closely with the New York-based abortion rights group Center for Reproductive Rights, said such detailed demographic information will make it possible to identify patients, especially those who live in small towns.

"These are women who are already in a tragic situation, and the law will expose them about a very, very personal matter," Davis told Foxnews.com on Tuesday. "It's a violation of patient privacy rights to put that information up there."

Jennifer Mondino, a staff attorney with the Center for Reproductive Rights, echoed Davis' complaint, saying, "The reporting requirements profoundly protrude on women's privacy."

"If you can think about being in a small town, you might know that teenager in the high school who is pregnant. It's not that difficult to link that person to the data that's going to be available on the Web site," she said.

Mondino added that the legislation "violates the spirit of HIPAA," the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, passed by Congress in 1966, which imposes strict regulations on patient privacy, including how such information can be used. The law mandates that information identifying patients must be protected.

But Oklahoma State Rep. Dan Sullivan, the Republican who authored the bill, told Foxnews.com the data will be useful in stepping up education that targets demographics with high rates of unwanted pregnancies.

"If there's something that we can do to positively impact that segment of that population -- and have a lowering effect on those rates -- then we want to be able to look at what policy decisions we can make."

Sullivan said the suggestion that women from small communities will be easily identified has been "misrepresented." He said that of the 77 counties in Oklahoma, only three have abortion providers.

"If a woman from rural Oklahoma (county) goes to Tulsa (county) and has an abortion, her abortion stats are lumped together with all the other women who went to Tulsa to seek an abortion," Sullivan said.

"There's no way a person can be singled out or identified the way it would be listed."

This is stupid as hell. I think everyone who knows me on here knows that while I may be a right winger, I am fairly logical, and will take the other side when it is necessary. This is one of those times.

Whatever happened to confidentiality? Do the patients affected not have the right to sue their doctors?

I think that some measure of privacy is necessary for every citizen. I am not overzealous enough to think that the government should not have any idea what goes on in my life, but this is an instance that I think we can all agree that government is overstepping it's bounds. This law forces doctors to give up all the information on patients, short of their name and phone number. These results can be scanned to determine who people are.

I personally think that the government does not need to know how many abortions are performed.

I think abortions are deplorable acts. I, personally, don't care if they are legal or not, but I understand that there are those who do. I also understand, that for them, keeping them legal is a solid solution. I don't think we should be killing babies, but I also think that there are people who don't need kids, that there are orphanages that can't handle more kids, etc.

I also think that once the procedure is done, it is done, and listing any possible way for people to find out who had one is a bit too much intrusion on privacy by the government.

 

[Slyfox696]

Wow, this is just ridiculous. I guess if you can't justify the outlawing of abortion, do the next best thing. Bully women to the point where they won't get one.

I honestly cannot think of words to describe the heinous nature of this law, basically criminalizing women who choose to have an abortion. So, when some wacko finds a woman who had an abortion and kills her, can the family then sue the government for wrongful death?

This is so beyond absurd, if I lived in Oklahoma, I would move. Fucking bullshit, and a complete travesty to confidentiality.

 

[HBK-aholic]

So basically, "You can have an abortion, but we're going to tell the whole world about it if you do". Patient confidentiality anyone? And the scum of Pro-life activists are going to have a field day with this. If they can kill a doctor who performs an abortion, who knows what they're going to do with women they know have had one. These are the same people who scream "murderer" at women on arguably the toughest day of their life because they don't give a damn about them. I wonder how they feel when the baby they save becomes a doctor working at an abortion clinic.

Eugh, anyway, yeah this is completely unfair in all ways, what does it help? The positives in no way can outweigh the negatives here.

 

[klunderbunker]

There's no excuse for this. What is this going to solve? If I read the article correctly, it says that this is to provide demographics to help with education. Ok, it's fine to want to do that. I'm currently taking a Political Science class about how to conduct research for just such a thing. There's a common system that might work a bit better here: it's called a voluntary survey. They've worked for years and they would work here. In a word, this is ridiculous. What in the hell was this guy on when he wrote this? The idea is to educate in order to prevent right? Ok, so what you're saying is that if a woman is raped and becomes pregnant, a simple bit of education can help that? That's in essence what's being said here. Or maybe education can be helpful in curing a condition that my friend was born with that more or less makes it lethal for her to have children. Yeah I'm sure a few classes will cure up every thing wrong with her body. This is moronic and a thinly veiled attempt to push the party's social views. What scares me even more is that this passed. That's what's really scary: he got people to agree with him. Note to self: don't go to Oklahoma. Go to Texas where things are better.

Did I really just say that/

 

[gd]

Ya, this is pretty stupid. If it is just for "educational purposes", I don't see why they have to post in on a website for everyone to see. That just doesn't make any sense. Regardless of your thoughts on abortion, this is just plain wrong and a violation of human rights. If this law actually goes into effect, that'd be quite ridiculous. I really see no justification for it whatsoever, it's just silly.

 

[Razor]

I hate it when people make unwarranted comparisons. That's why I repeatedly preach "Godwin's Law" when someone brings up Hitler when we're discussing MTV. It's unwarranted, and making hyperbolic statements like "Obama is making his own version of Hitler's Youth by pushing for increased volunteerism in our children" make me twitch.

However, in this case, the claim of "Salem Witch Hunt" or, perhaps more fittingly, "McCarthy Red Scare" is appropriate. We've been in a witch hunt of sorts for the past decade or so, demonizing any woman who gets an abortion as a irresponsible cunt who doesn't deserve to live in our God-Fearing America. That's fine that people want to say that filth, as long as they didn't go through with violence. They haven't, as of yet. At least with the women. These murders of Abortion doctors are outrageous, and completely hypocritical. But I digress.

Now we've transcended to the next level. We've gone past a blind, general witch hunt. We've landed smack in the middle of a McCarthy Red Scare. People are being outed as getting a completely valid medical procedure, and having their personal information found out. Not only that, but if the doctor fails to give the data over he'll have his medical license revoked.

Whatever happened to the idea that doctors could actually refuse valid medical treatment? Bush passed a law or declaration of whatever that stated doctors could actually refuse to give abortions, even in life-saving scenarios. That kind of bullshit made my skin crawl. That'd be like a doctor refusing to give a liver transplant because the recipient was gay.

So, according to the conservative law makers that backed Bush's abomination, this is fine? Forcing doctors to give out information that clearly violates patient's rights is okay? They allowed doctors to fail the Hippocratic Oath with that horrible legislation a year or so ago, and now they're actually forcing doctors to fail the Hippocratic Oath? Buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuullshit.

Only a few things can come of this.

1. Abortion protesters start to personalize their protests. Direct protests of people's homes, direct mailing, the works. You may not believe they can do this from the information provided, but we live in the Internet Age. I guarantee you they can find the address of a woman after getting the information listed on the website.
   
2. Women stop getting abortions in Oklahoma. Which will push this legislation out to other states, further hindering the patients rights of women everywhere in the United States. Also, it will lead to further related parent deaths from pregnancies that should have been aborted and a further burden on the government for taking care of pregnancies that the parents should have aborted, but now can't care for.
   
3. Doctors will start to hide abortion costs. Abortions will start to be listed as a "Gynecological Visit" and the charges will be spread out over other tests. Oklahoma will see a sharp decline in abortions, alright. But only on a data sheet.

 

[Remix]

I'm pretty sure that not keeping personal medical information private is illegal. I'm a pharmacy student and one of the big no-nos is releasing any personal information. Infact in order to go on any placements (required to pass the year) you need to attend a workshop on it and releasing personal data (usually by insufficient anonymisation) can result in you getting kicked off the course.

personal information includes ANY information that could be used to identify a person (such as gender, height, age, name (obviously) etc.) so this, at the very least is completely unethical.