Notes on Industry Support for S. 1360

[James Love <love@tap.org>]

November 20, 1995

A few notes on industry support for S. 1360.  Today I was
interviewed by Joseph Goedert, the Editor of Health Data Network
News.  Mr. Goedert faxed me his November 6,1 1995 story, "Senate
to Tackle Patient Privacy Issue," where he identified the key
industry associations that supported S. 1360 as:

     Association for Electronic Health Care Transactions
     Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange
     American Medical Association
     American Hospital Association
     Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association
     Computer-based Record Institute
     National Association of Retail Druggist

Like several news organizations, Health Data Network News
identified the largely industry funded Center for Democracy and
Technology as a "consumer advocacy" organization (a
characterization that I would not make).

Mr. Goedert's story also discussed a few companies.  For example,
CIS Technologies of Tulsa Oklahoma was said to have "a warehouse
of data from more than 85 million claims," that it wasn't using
because of "uncertain rules for using the information."  
Paraphrasing the views of Jeanne Schulte Scott, CIS's director of
legal and government affairs, the article said "the Bennett bill
gives guidelines with a relative degree of protection for CIS and
other companies."

Goedert quoted Dr. Paul Tang, the medical director of information
systems for Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago and chair
of the Computer-Based Patient Record institute as saying that
passage of S. 1360 would help promote standards for clinical
electronic data exchange systems, including electronic medical
records, which are  "a fundamental building block for sharing
data."  Goedert wrote "The Bennett bill would make it easier to
develop some of these standards, such as a universal patient
identifier, Tang of Northwestern Memorial Hospital says."

Goedert said that many companies that were reluctant to make
investments in medical records systems "out of fear of
encountering privacy problems down the road would find the going
easier if Bennett's bill is adopted."   Then Goedert quotes CIS's
Scott as saying "This gives a clear green light to go ahead."

Since Joseph Goedert seemed to know quite a bit about the issue,
I asked him which company seemed the most active on the S. 1360. 
He said, almost immediately, IBM.

I then check out Senator Bennett's October 24, 1995 comments in
the Congressional Record, when the bill was introduced, and sure
enough, IBM was prominently mentioned for its work on S. 1360.

     [From October 24, 1995 Congressional Record, CR S15579]

     I want to thank all of those who have been working with us
     on the issue of health information privacy and, in
     particular, wish to commend the Vermont Health Information
     Consortium, . . . the American Health Information Management
     Association . . .  IBM Corp. and the Blue Cross and Blue
     Shield Association for their tireless efforts in working to
     achieve a significant consensus on this important matter.

Senator Bennett also singled out the Center for Democracy and
Technology,  the Vermont Health Information Consortium, and four
non-profit organizations.

Then, thinking that today's (November 20, 1995) New York Times
editorial was a bit too sloppy, having made several important
errors of fact regarding who gets access to S. 1360 (issues that
were discussed in some detail in the Nov. 15 story on the same
topic), I checked out the New York Times latest 10k statement and
found that longtime IBM official John F. Akers is a member of the
New York Times board of directors.  I'm not saying that I know
that John Akers helped place today's editorial.  However, I will
say that I've seen this type of thing before with the Times,
particularly with Richard L. Gelb, the Bristol-Myers Squibb
executive who also sits on the NYT board of directors.  (For a
recent example, consider the November 16, 1995 NYT front page
story about the benefits of Bristol-Myers Squibb's drug
pravachol.)

Finally, I looked at today's Corporate Crime Reporter's (November
20, 1995) story on the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT),
and learned that IBM contributed $25,000 to CDT in 1995.

What does this mean?  Keep your eye on IBM, I guess, if Joseph
Goedert knows what he is talking about.

Jamie


----------------------------------------------------------------------
James Love, love@tap.org
P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036; v. 202/387-8030; f. 202/234-5176
Consumer Project on Technology; http://www.essential.org/cpt/cpt.html
Taxpayer Assets Project; http://www.essential.org/tap/tap.html