Is Big Brother Watching You?

Unhappily there is no explicit provision in the U.S. Constitution for the protection of privacy. In the Durham case relating to the right of individuals to share information about contraception, Justice William O. Douglas was obliged to speak of a "penumbra" of surrounding rights that would provide grounds for inferring a right to privacy not specified by our anemic Bill of Rights. This decision laid the groundwork for the subsequent Roe v. Wade defense of the right to abortion as a matter of a women's right to privacy.

It is disconcerting, then, to see the constant nibbling away at this right, culminating in the notorious provisions of the Patriot Act:

http://news.com.com/2100-1023-275026.html

http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/Terrorism/PATRIOT/

I happened to receive a Notice of Practices from a medical organization the other days that is truly disconcerting. I will simply list the headings of the growing list of so-called specified Uses and Disclosures of Protected Health Information, which really detail grounds for disclosing confidential health information -- to organizations -- and to all those engaged in recording and distributing information therein:

* Treatment

* Payment

* Business Operations

* Abuse, Neglect and Domestic Violence

* Health Oversight

* Product Monitoring/Repair/Recall

* Legal Proceedings

* Law Enforcement

* Coroners, Funeral Directors and Organ Donation

* Research

* Criminal Activity

* National Security and Military Activity

* Workers Compensation

* Inmates and Correctional Institutions.

The sentences following these headings mainly read "We may disclose ..." "We may release ..." or "We may use ..."

"Is Big Brother is watching YOU!"

Sorry, the wording of this posting most likely means that it is being picked up (and your address as recipient of it) somewhere. Sorry about that. EAK