From the help-us-help-you dept.
Nassim Khadem reports:
NIB chief executive Mark Fitzgibbon is hoping the private health insurance fund can get permission from its 1.5 million customers to access their digital health record, despite mounting privacy and security concerns.
In an interview with Fairfax Media, Mr Fitzgibbon said Australians opting out of the federal government’s digital My Health Record system were preventing health providers from accessing vital information that could be helpful in a medical emergency.
[…]
Private health insurers say this data could be a way to manage higher health insurance claims being made by an ageing population and associated rising premiums, while critics warn the data may result in more exclusions and less access.
“We are moving to this world in which we’re able to, like never before, predict, prevent and better manage or better treat diseases based on knowledge we have of your individual health profile,” Mr Fitzgibbon said.
“We cannot do that without information about who you are … We desperately need this data to make the world a better place.”
Oh, they desperately need it to help you and your data will never ever be used against you and they will never ever have a data breach due to sloppy security?
According to this news report, over 20,000 people have already opted out of MyHealthRecord since the opt-out period opened on Monday.
Read more on Sydney Morning Herald.