Re: NHS records will be shared
Originally Posted by
paula
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In England your NHS records will be shared outside the health service unless you opt out befor 23rd June. data will be shared with researchers and companies outside the nhs. medical history 0f 55million patients will be imported to new database
this was on google news
Thanks for bringing this to our attention .....
As I understand this "scheme", it's not being introduced by "the NHS" but by
NHS Digital:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NHS_Digital
NHS Digital is
the trading name of the Health and Social Care Information Centre, which is the national provider of information, data and IT systems for commissioners, analysts and clinicians in health and social care in England, particularly those involved with the National Health Service of England. The organisation is
an executive non-departmental public body of the Department of Health and Social Care.
Seemingly, therefore, this non-NHS service provider is introducing the scheme at the behest of the Minister of the Department of Health and Social Care, "Slippery" Hancock.
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...eds-explaining
The records being stored contain the most private details of a person’s life. The proposals suggest mass collection of every English patient’s history, including mental health episodes, their smoking and drinking habits, and diagnoses of diseases such as cancer.
But it will also include dated instances of domestic violence, abortions, sexual histories and criminal offences.
Given the proposed scope of such a database, it is reasonable to ask who will be given this data, and for what purpose.
While medical bodies have been consulted, they have hardly given the plans a ringing endorsement. GPs may be reluctant, as they will be accountable for the data transfer. The audit trails of much less detailed
hospital data which has been transferred to the private sector hardly inspires confidence in this government’s willingness to hold to account institutions that ignore safeguards. Campaigners point to
shocking failures to enforce patient privacy, with little comeback for transgressors.
This is the biggest data grab in the history of the health service. NHS Digital says that “we do not allow data to be used
solely for commercial purposes”. That is hardly reassuring. If the data was just
partly used for commercial purposes presumably that is fine with Matt Hancock, the health secretary.
The public is likely to take a dim view of
a government that allows informatics firms to pay for patients’ records, then sell “market access” and “market insights” for a substantial profit to a host of unreported drug, data and tech companies. There is no doubt about the power of AI to extract value by linking and reusing health data. It should ring alarm bells that
ministers propose extracting sensitive personal medical records without clear purpose and with no meaningful information governance measures to keep pace with these developments.
How on earth is Hancock getting away with this .....