Over the last few years I have been a regular visitor to the myHealthRecord site to browse the press releases and to check what the current advice on various topics related to the system was.
You can imagine my curiosity and interest when a relatively new section appeared at the top of the page.
Here it is:
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Learn more about My Health Record and how your privacy is protected.
In immediate danger? Call 000 now.
For 24/7 support and counselling, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732.
Call 1800 723 471 if you think your family's safety is at risk due to
information in a My Health Record.
Find
out more
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The link is:
https://www.myhealthrecord.gov.au/
The bold text is the important bit – if you follow the link you see this:
Family and domestic violence
If you are affected by family and domestic violence, you can take steps to control the information in your My Health Record.
In
immediate danger? Call 000 now.
For 24/7 support and counselling, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732.
Call 1800 723 471 if you think your family's safety is at risk due to
information in a My Health Record.
Concerned that someone may find you or your child through information in your child’s My Health Record?
For 24/7 support, call the My Health Record helpline on 1800 723 471. There are protections we can quickly put in place to protect your family’s safety. They include:
- Restrict access to a record
- Suspend a record
- Cancel a record
- See who has access to a record and remove a person’s access if they’re not eligible
- Set a code to restrict new healthcare providers having access to the record or to specific documents within in it
- Remove documents from a record
Family and domestic violence isn’t always physical and it can happen to anyone at any time, regardless of age, gender or sexual orientation. It can happen anywhere, including at home or at work. It can cause you to live in fear for yourself and your family. This can happen even if you’ve left a violent relationship.
Learn more on the Services Australia website.
Here is the direct link:
https://www.myhealthrecord.gov.au/for-you-your-family/howtos/family-and-domestic-violence
While I am pretty sure that most of those being threatened with domestic violence (DV) are probably not even aware of the risk of being tracked and traced using the #myHR it seems to me we have to wonder who has assessed the potential level of risk to victims and what they have concluded.
I have heard regularly that the risks exist but have never seen any research / review that has attempted to quantify the scale of the risk. Surely we should have? Has anyone?
That the front page of the #myHR mentions the issue can, of course, alert a perpetrator to another way to find the fleeing victim as well as suggest what you as a victim can do!
We do know that at least woman a week is being murdered by an intimate partner and a many more are suffering on an ongoing basis.
If it was totally clear that the #myHR is helping and benefiting many, having this risk may just be acceptable, but the benefit is not clear and so, unless there is real quantification we should just shut the wretched thing down. Right now it is a clear cut ‘honey pot’ for perpetrators,
Does anyone know the number of calls there have been to the help line?
With the COVID-19 lockdown causing increased DV we need clear
stats and metrics urgently so an assessment of the risk / reward can be made. A warning add campaign as suggested by Bernard might also be a good idea to raise awareness of the issue.
Another case I suspect where Government Secrecy will mean we will never know!
David.
why have that page without publicising it?
ReplyDeleteIs it so they can claim to have "done the right thing" when all they are really doing is covering their collective backsides?
More shameful deception.
This one is a little alarmist and uses fear. Fortunately bugger all people they are targeting would even find it. Interesting it provides a link to use in emergency.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.myhealthrecord.gov.au/news-and-media/my-health-record-stories/flu-season
The Chappy in the article is a MyHR clinical lead. Meeting his obligations. Similar to ePIP
ReplyDelete“But this can only happen if they’re using the My Health Record system,” he adds.
ReplyDeleteWhat a load of cobblers The healthcare system works just the same as it ever did - My Health Record has made no discernible difference. If it had, GPs and ADHA would be telling us all about it through peer reviewed papers.
The silence is deafening.
#Anon 12:09 PM
ReplyDeleteI wonder if the Chappy in the article is keeping up to speed with real world data? There is great uncertainty about the rate of flu this year. There is even more about myhr's usefulness. To claim that myhr is essential is just foolish at best and scaremongering at worst.
COVID-19’s silver lining for our flu season
1 June 2020
http://medicalrepublic.com.au/covid-19s-silver-lining-for-our-flu-season/29684
At its peak in March this year, the FluTracking surveillance system reported that around 1.7% of its participants reported flu-like symptoms, but this had dropped to around 0.3% in its latest report for the week ending May 24.
This is an “historically low” rate, according to the report, which lists the five-year average for this time of year as around 2.5%.
...
“I think it’s really clear that the measures that we’ve implemented to control COVID-19 are ones that will control a large number of infectious diseases, including all the respiratory viruses, including influenza,” Associate Professor Paul Griffin, an infectious diseases physician and microbiologist at the University of Queensland, said.
...
"The hardcore flu season is quite late in the year,” he said. "It typically peaks in August- September, so we just started the flu season."
Two fundamental data points in a person's health record - birth and death.
ReplyDeleteThe Department of Health and ADHA are doing their damnedest to capture the births, but death?
Even though the My Health Record would appear to be best suited for such data, there is no sign anyone is even thinking of using it.
Real-time suicide data could be years away
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/real-time-suicide-data-years-away-as-doctors-warn-of-mental-health-spike-20200529-p54xnl.html
When someone dies is their My Health Record deleted or archived? When? What's the process? If it is archived, who can access it for research purposes?
When someone dies is their My Health Record deleted or archived? When? What's the process? If it is archived, who can access it for research purposes?
ReplyDeleteOn the surface you ask a question that is in the legislation - 130 years and can’t remember how long after a recorded death. Peel a layer and you question raises a number of untested assumptions. I don’t now if the record can be disposed of or how retention is managed. MyHR does not have a records authority which will make for confusion for Bureaucrats. Wonder if the Archives act is a higher order legislative instrument