1)  http://society.guardian.co.uk/health/news/0,,1936403,00.html

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1) Warning over privacy of 50m patient files


Call for boycott of medical database accessible by up to 250,000 NHS staff

(2 )What you can do (see below for letter)


)David Leigh and Rob Evans
Wednesday November 1, 2006
The Guardian


Millions of personal medical records are to be uploaded regardless of patients' wishes to a central national database from where information can be made available to police and security services, the Guardian has learned.
Details of mental illnesses, abortions, pregnancy, HIV status, drug-taking, or alcoholism may also be included, and there are no laws to prevent DNA profiles being added. The uploading is planned under Whitehall's bedevilled £12bn scheme to computerise the health service.

After two years of confusion and delays, the system will start coming into effect in stages early next year.

Though the government says the database will revolutionise management of the NHS, civil liberties critics are calling it "data rape" and are urging Britons to boycott it. The British Medical Association also has reservations. "We believe that the government should get the explicit permission of patients before transferring their information on to the central database," a spokeswoman said yesterday.

continues.

2)  http://society.guardian.co.uk/health/news/0,,1936192,00.html
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What can patients do?


Wednesday November 1, 2006
The Guardian


Ross Anderson, professor of security engineering at Cambridge University, believes that patients do have legal rights over their medical records: "Write and insist that you are not put on the NHS data spine," Prof Anderson says. "If enough people boycott having centralised NHS records, with a bit of luck the service will be abandoned."
If you are concerned, you should discuss it with your GP. You can put a block on your own data by writing to:

The Secretary of State for Health
Richmond House
79 Whitehall Terrace
London SW1A 2NS

And send the same letter to your GP.

It should say:

Dear Sir/ Madam

I require you not to begin processing my sensitive personal data to the proposed NHS Summary Care Record on the Spine. It is likely to cause me substantial unwarranted distress because:

1. No 'sealed envelopes' yet exist to limit access

2. No online patient system yet exists to correct errors

3. Data uploaded may include genetic, psychological or sexual information

4. It is intended to make my data available to social workers, researchers and commercial firms

5. My consent will not be asked before beginning processing

6. Adequate criminal penalties against abuse do not yet exist

7. Police and other agencies can gain access to a potentially unlimited range of information about me. There is abundant evidence that computer databases - including police, vehicle licensing and banking computers - are routinely penetrated by private investigators on behalf of clients, including media organisations

8. 250,000 smart cards have been issued granting access to the Spine

9. The department threatens to withhold appropriate medical care to objectors

10. Doctors say there is no necessity to design the Spine in this way

For these reasons, among others, I strongly fear that I am in danger of having false or damaging health information fall into the wrong hands. My privacy is being unnecessarily violated.

Yours faithfully


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