The Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 (HR 493), recently passed by Congress, has inadvertently legalized the sharing of genetic information without patient consent.

Sue Blevins, President of the Institute for Health Freedom, notes that the new bill applies the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) regulations to genetic data. HIPAA regulations permit data sharing without consent with in connection with treatment, payment, or oversight of health-care operations.

The intent of the HIPAA regulations is to protect medical records in the digital age, but many HIPAA critics argue that it opens up privacy issues as a result of the routine sharing of personal health information. Regardless of the validity of this argument, qualifying genetic test results as health information can be problematic. Genetic information can be used to determine rates for health plans, and as the new bill provides this data to health care companies, it could be cause for discrimination.

This is a controversial topic, to say the least. HIPAA has its critics, though its intentions are great. Health information, in and of itself, is controversial, and in particular genetic information is about as personal as information gets. Some advocates are fighting for personal ownership of genetic information, in order to avoid genetic privacy issues such as those presented here.

Via FOX Business ; Image: clarita @ morguefile Tags: genetic, genetic privacy, genes, genetic testing, privacy, health privacy, health information, genetic information