Patient Privacy Rights is campaigning to restrict the use of prescription information. I was impressed by their video.
The thing I like about the campaign is that it’s mostly directed at pharmacy chains. I’d like pharmacies’ practices with prescription information to be one of the dimensions on which they compete. We need more information and we should use it when we decide which pharmacy to go to.
A wee quibble: The video talks about what the law should be, and the campaign cc:s members of Congress. I’m not impressed with legislative attempts to protect privacy. The legislative process is a playground dominated by organized interests – governments, corporations, and their lobbyists – not by consumers. In fact, the PPR site links to a Hastings Center report that documents nicely how the HIPPA “privacy rule” is not a privacy protection at all. My own effort on that score, from a few years back, is here.
That gloss aside, though, restriction of prescription information is the right outcome, and addressing the issue to pharmacy chains in the right way to pursue it.
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