Community deserves better than HIPAA law gag orders

Clay County residents deserve to know what’s going on during the COVID-19 pandemic. The cone of silence required by federal laws not only erodes a community’s trust, it can endanger lives.

As of Wednesday morning, nine people have died in the county of the coronavirus and 168 have been infected. Did you come into contact with any of them? Did they slice cheese at a deli for you or give you change in the drive-thru line? Did you cross paths at a grocery store or on a jogging trail? Are there neighborhoods, businesses or nursing homes where the numbers are dramatically increasing?

Good luck getting those answers. And not knowing could kill you.

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA, mandates a gag order on health and government officials from releasing any information about a person diagnosed with the virus. It provides all patients with individual rights, mainly to privacy between themselves, their provider and their healthcare institution.

Most individual patient data is kept confidential. As such, it is difficult under HIPAA’s provisions to share the information which others may deem necessary to control the spread of disease in times such as these.

The purpose of the law was to protect a patient’s privacy. Nobody argues with that. The person’s name, age and sex aren’t important in the grand scheme. I don’t need to know if they’re in the hospital or at home. But informing the public of possible contact doesn’t expose any personal information. It keeps others from contracting the virus.

We don’t need to know who, but how, when and where is an important step to protecting ourselves and our families.

For most in the healthcare business – people who’ve been charged with keeping all of us safe – HIPAA laws are nothing more than a quagmire of legal nonsense.

After all, isn’t the best way to prevent the spread is to stop it before it starts?

“Balancing the privacy of the individuals and their families, whether confirmed cases, or individuals being monitored, and the confidentiality of the epidemiological investigations with the responsibility to disclose information to protect the public is a vital role of the FDOH [Florida Department of Health],” said Lisa Rogers, the Community Health Services Liaison for the Clay County Health Department. “The data that is within HIPAA guidelines that we can share is available on the FDOH website, dashboard, and daily report for the most up-to-date verified information.”

The Florida COVID-19 Data and Surveillance Dashboard is a good place to get general information. It breaks down the numbers of infected and dead by each county, and those numbers generally are updated a couple times a day.

What the dashboard can’t – make that won’t – tell you is where the person contracted the virus, where they’ve been and who’ve they’ve possibly infected in the process.

That’s important stuff to know.

The people at the Clay County Health Department are under considerable pressure to protect its residents while trying to find ways to reduce the spread of COVID-19. They are forced to follow rules that clearly weren’t intended to address a worldwide pandemic, especially one that relies so heavily on the public’s need for crucial information. They clearly are in a no-win position.

There have been several reports of a widespread infection at the post-hospital., long-term care center in Orange Park. We may never know.

Members at Sawgrass County Club in Ponte Vedra Beach recently were sent an email telling them a member played golf and was in the lounge during a particular weekend. The member’s name wasn’t mentioned and nobody at the club revealed any further details. Members who were at the clubhouse that weekend were given the information so they could make informed decisions about their own health.

Why can’t we expect the same from our federal, state and county health officials?

In the meantime, Rogers said the Florida Department of Health in Clay County is working with doctors, nursing homes and hospitals.

“At this time, there is no evidence to suggest a heightened concern in our county,” she said.

Since we’re being kept in the dark, we have no choice but to believe it.

(Clay Today staff writer Bruce Hope contributed to this story.)