Class Action to prevent incentive payments for EHR

A class action suit has been filed on June 25 in the U.S. District Court for Southern New York alleging that the Recovery Act's goal for every American to have an electronic health record by 2014 threatens the privacy rights of every person not already covered by Medicare or Medicaid.

Beatrice Heghmann is the lead plaintiff against Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, White House Office of Health Reform Director Nancy-Ann Deparle and Acting Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Charlene Frizzera. Courthouse News Service reported that the lawsuit claims that, rather than go by HIPAA's rule for the limited amount of information doctors must give the government in special circumstances, Sebelius would now have the authority to set the minimum amount of information doctors would report.

The suit also claims the Act would allow the government to link a person's medical information to other personal information, like a Social Security number or driver's license.

Heghmann says the push for EHRs exists solely to obtain confidential health information, according to Courthouse News. She's seeking an injunction to prevent the distribution of incentive payments for purchasing EHR systems. 

I think this is the natural course of events for EHR. The EHR system is being refined, hopefully for the better.

I'm pretty sure that the court will balance public policy and private citizen's rights. I will try to find the complaint.