Thought i'd forward this to the list for discussion... Do we know of databases like this contravene existing and/new legislation such as c6? ---------- Forwarded Message ---------- Date: Monday, January 08, 2001 10:28 AM -0800 From: Sonia Arrison <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "'[EMAIL PROTECTED]'" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: CANUCKS: Medical Privacy in Canada Do you know anyone who has had an abortion? If so, they might want to know this: "The Canadian Institute of Health Information, a non-profit spinoff from Statistics Canada, has so far created 18 massive databases that offer everything from who's had abortions in Canada to profiles of the mentally ill." For more on medical privacy, see this: http://www.torontostar.com/apps/AppLogic+FTContentServer?pagename=thestar/La yout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=978928267281&call_page=TS_News&call_pageid= 968332188492&call_pagepath=News/News Up for sale: Your secret health files Companies buy medical histories from MDs, nurses Tyler Hamilton TECHNOLOGY REPORTER Dr. James Sears calls himself North America's top medical investigator. So if you've got any skeletons in your closet, watch out: Prying eyes may be watching. Two years ago, Sears decided to launch a service that performs medical background checks for companies wanting to verify the health history of job candidates. The idea was to sniff out records - increasingly in electronic format - that reveal undisclosed medical conditions that could result in numerous sick days and low productivity somewhere down the road. ``We do something nobody else in Canada does,'' says Sears, founder of The Second Opinion, a Toronto-based business. ``In five years, we feel it will be as commonplace as checking references on a resume.'' To date, his clients have included Canadian Tire and the Toronto Transit Commission. Sears says he doesn't need access to the Internet to carry out his investigations. Rather, his methods are much more simple: Make phone calls to doctors' offices and hospitals, and request data from receptionists, nurses and administrators who generally have access to computer medical records. Most times he has permission to carry out his checks through consent provisions on job applications. ``If you don't, then you have to do a lot of hunting and digging. And we have our ways of doing that,'' he says. [...] Also, Wendy Mesley's Undercurrents just did a show on privacy, you can find it here: http://tv.cbc.ca/undercurrents/2000_2001/jan07_01.html#story_1 ------------------------------------------------------------------------- CANUCKS -- the moderated mailing list for Canadians living in the U.S. For details, visit http://www.canadiansintheus.com/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------- End Forwarded Message ---------- ********************************************** To (un)subscribe visit the list's WWW page at: <http://crypto-canada.greatvideo.com>
