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Did ambitious NSA officials unintentionally end Obamacare years ago?
[By D. Kellus Pruitt DDS]
If loss of trust in encryption ends Obamacare, can whistleblower Edward Snowden be blamed for that as well? Yep.
What’s even more ominous, the former National Security Agency contractor’s news that encrypted medical records are no longer secure reached Alaska on a weekend.
“Risky electronic health records: Alaska should make information exchange system safer – Imagine: The National Security Agency slips into your doctor’s office and peeks at your medical records,”
by Alaska ACLU executive director Joshua Decker was posted hours ago on Newsminer.com, out of Fairbanks.
Decker questions the security of the state’s Health Information Exchange (HIE), and offers common sense but costly steps which arguably lessen the danger of privacy breaches – including giving patients the choice of “opting-in” to permit their encrypted, but increasingly vulnerable identities to be shared online via Obamacare’s exchanges.
My POV
In my opinion, if informed Americans are given the choice of volunteering to risk identity theft, HIEs won’t be around a year from now, and neither will Obamacare. If informed Americans are not given a choice, the costs are even greater. Americans deserve honesty.
National Obamacare Hangs in the Balance
In a related, slow-burning game-changer, Obamacare hangs in the balance, not just for Alaska, but for the nation.
It was September 5th when the Guardian Weekly posted: “Revealed: how US and UK spy agencies defeat internet privacy and security,” written by James Ball, Julian Borger and Glenn Greenwald, and based on top secret NSA information Snowden stole.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/05/nsa-gchq-encryption-codes-security
Snowden told the Guardian that years ago, the NSA joined with the UK’s spy agency GCHQ (Government Communications Headquarters) to successfully make encryption obsolete – including for medical records.
Naturally, if properly informed Americans fear that secrets they tell their doctors might be breached, incorrect EHRs become less than worthless. They become dangerous.
More on Health Information Exchanges
What’s more, even before the added expense of waiting for Americans to opt-in to the exchanges – instead of discouraging them from opting-out – the very funding for the increasingly-battered Obamacare is based on a rumor of savings.
Starting years ago, health IT lobbyists, including former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, told lawmakers to expect annual savings of $77 billion and 100,000 lives – quoting the results of a once popular, EHR-friendly 2005 RAND study which was funded by General Electric and Cerner Corporation.
As you can see, while we were not paying attention, we were had!
The RAND Study
Predictably, both GE and Cerner profited immensely from the development and sales of EHR systems before the RAND study was widely discredited months ago – even by RAND.
According to a NY Times article from January, “Cerner’s revenue has nearly tripled since the report was released, to a projected $3 billion in 2013, from $1 billion in 2005.”
(See: “In Second Look, Few Savings From Digital Health Records by Reed Abelson and Julie Creswell, January 10, 2013).
Assessment
Last weekend’s bad news for Obamacare is still under the radar, but I predict within days it will become apparent that the mounting obstacle between President Obama and healthcare reform will be in regaining trust his administration squandered while helping GE and Cerner profits at the expense of soon-to-be pissed off American patients.
Conclusion
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Filed under: Health Law & Policy, Information Technology, Pruitt's Platform | Tagged: Cerner, D. Kellus Pruitt, Did the NSA end Obamacare?, Edward Snowden, eHR, EMRs, Glenn Greenwald, Government Communications Headquarters, health information exchange, HIE, Joshua Decker, Newt Gingrich, NSA, ObamaCare, Rand |
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