New government rules that will allow ministers to access
confidential medical data have been called into question by health
service professionals.
Mike SimonsHealth minister Alan Milburn will next week ask Parliament for
powers to give confidential medical records to third parties, even
if the patient and their clinician object.
The proposals, in Clause 59 of the Health and Social Care Bill,
will go before Parliament next week. They illustrate the data
protection and human rights issues that are facing the health
service as it moves towards electronic patient records and
transmission of data through NHSNet.
A core principle of the Government's NHS IT plan is the
protection of patient confidentiality, but the new proposals make a
mockery of this, said Fleur Fisher, expert in medical ethics and
chairwoman of the British Medical Association's Foundation for
Aids. "What they are doing is completely unacceptable," she
said.
