Entering your medical records??

SOME MORE OF THE SECRECY USED BY THE DEMOCRATES TO HIDE THEIR FULL INTENT. BE AWARE OF THE CLANDESTINED EFFORTS BY THESE DOGS OF THE NIGHT TO STRIP YOU AND ME OF OUR PERSONAL AND PRIVATE RIGHTS. DAVE ANDERSON




CNSNews.com
Stimulus Law Does Not Require All Americans to Enter Their Medical Records into National System, Dems Say
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
By Josiah Ryan, Staff Writer


(CNSNews.com) – Two top House Democrats told CNSNews.com on Friday that a section in the $787-billion economic stimulus bill that requires the creation of “electronic health records for each person in the United States by 2014” does not mean that the medical records of every American must be included in the new national infrastructure.

In the bill, which passed both chambers of Congress on Friday and which President Obama is scheduled to sign Tuesday, $3 billion is allocated for a “National Coordinator for Health Information Technology” to create and meet the objectives of a strategic plan to build a national infrastructure of “electronic health records for each person in the United States by 2014.”

House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and House Health Subcommittee Chairman Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) both told CNSNews.com on Friday that they do not think the law mandates that every American’s health care records must be entered into the national system.

“You mean that everyone has to be in the database?” Pallone said when CNSNews.com asked him if the provision was mandatory. “I don’t think so.”

“My understanding of what we are talking about is that this is information that you use with your own doctor for your own purposes,” said Pallone. “I don’t think there is any requirement you be in some national database either totally, either collectively or with individual data that you might want to provide.”

When asked whether there was a provision in the bill that allowed Americans to keep their records out of the program, Waxman said, "Yes."

“We tried to be very careful about individual privacy and we have a lot of protections written into the bill,” said Waxman.

However, Waxman's office did not provide CNSNews.com with the provision in the bill that would allow individuals to exempt themselves from the program. A source close to Waxman said that the bill’s description of the program as a “strategic plan” with “goals” and “specific objectives” means that its implementation will not be mandatory.

According to the language of the bill, it is the duty of the “National Coordinator for Health Information Technology” to ensure that federal health information technology programs are “meeting the objectives of the strategic plan” to, among other things, provide for “the electronic exchange and use of health information and the enterprise integration of such information” -- and the “utilization of an electronic health record for each person in the Unites States by 2014.”

According to a summary of the stimulus posted on the House Committee on Appropriations Web site, the package includes a total of $19 billion to “update and computerize our healthcare system to cut red tape, prevent medical mistakes, and help reduce healthcare costs by billions of dollars each year.”

The electronic health records, or "EHRs," according to the bill, will include clinical health information, medical history, and demographics, including race, ethnicity, primary language, and gender information.

Sources on Capitol Hill told CNSNews.com that both Waxman and Pallone were instrumental in ensuring the health information technology programs were included in the stimulus package.

Meanwhile, members of the Senate told CNSNews.com that they were unaware of these health-care provisions included in the 1,071-page legislation.

“I have not looked at those particular provisions as much as I have on the general effectiveness [of the stimulus],” Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) told CNSNews.com on Friday. “I don’t know frankly enough about that provision to give you an informed comment.” McCain is a member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.

“I don’t know,” Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) told CNSNews.com, when asked abpit the provision. “I haven’t thought about it.”