possible to anonymise? DNA Database etc, Indie page 8

[[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Ian G Batten)]

On Fri, 29 Aug 2003, Adrian Midgley wrote:
> Well, if the auditor asserts a right to inspect it, and decides to do so 
> in the full knowledge that the patient objects, 

Then they should be blasted all over the papers.  Obviously, the NHS and
the BMA believe that the organ retention scandal didn't matter, as
otherwise there'd be some slight sign that lessons were at least
noticed, if not actually learnt.  But for as long as the staff
(especially the administrative staff) of the NHS regard orders as an
absolute defence, and the NHS management believe that patients have no
rights, there will be an increasing tension over privacy.  It would be
nice to hear the BMA or somesuch actually say ``patients have a right
over their body and their records which is not contingent on the say-so
of a random junior staff''.  However, clearly the NHS is there for the
benefit of its staff, not the patients, and allowing the patients to
have rights would interfere with that.

ian