Love how you stop after the first two paragraphs there Nobby.
Quote:
The potential for the disclosure of medical records was first noticed when a newspaper reporter saw a clause in her medical centre's privacy policy that stated that they "may disclose medical information about you to authorised federal officials so they may without limitation ... provide protection to the President, other authorised persons or foreign heads of state or conduct special investigations, or conduct lawful intelligence, counter-intelligence or other national security activities authorised by law."
*cough* This language has been on medical forms for as long as I can remember. They're also on a lot of employment forms as well. This issue really has nothing to do with the Patriot Act at all, and I'm not aware of a single instance in which the Patriot Act has actually been used to obtain medical records without a warrant.
But hey, let's go on to the next paragraph:
Quote:
According to the ACLU, Additionally, medical records can be handed over to the police without a warrant in a number of circumstances outside the Patriot Act, including locating missing persons and if a crime has been committed on the premises of the patient. Section 215 of the Patriot Act gives the authorities the right to seize medical records (under the term "any tangible things") to investigate terrorism with a court order, without notice.
Yup. Nothing new. The government has had the power to do this in particular cases since long before the Patriot Act came along. I'm not saying this is great or that this isn't something we should look at. What I *am* saying is that the implication that it's those "darn Republicans and their Patriot Act" that may result in a violation of your medical confidentiality is pretty far off base. You were just as likely to have your medical records searched without a warrant 10 years ago as you are today.
And let's not miss the fact that the clause under the Patriot Act clearly states that it requires a court order (ie: a warrant). So... What we're really talking about is a story about a reporter who noticed that the medical forms indicated that medical records could be seized without a warrant. The reporter leaped to the assumption that this was a result of the Patriot Act. After actually investigating, it was discovered that it actually has nothing to do with the Patriot Act and has been around for awhile, and in fact the Patiot Act has *more* protection for the citizens privacy then other apparently "non-patriotic" laws, but it's apparently too good of a bit of rhetoric, so we'll just package the story in such a way that people who are bad at reading will assume it's the Patriot Act that's responsible...
Edited, Mon Jan 16 15:33:47 2006 by gbaji
