Massachusetts HIV list to require names

The Boston Globe reports:

Massachusetts public health authorities later this year will begin requiring that doctors report to the state the name of anyone testing positive for HIV.


The change, from the current system of using codes to identify cases, is part of a national campaign to more accurately chart the march of HIV so that prevention and treatment efforts are directed to communities where the need is greatest.

The state is promising to keep names confidential in secure computer files, but critics fear that the policy change will dissuade some people from getting tested for the virus, and they warn that no record system is foolproof.

The government that's big enough to get involved in medical care, eventually, is going to want to know to all about you.The irony here is Massachusetts holds itself out as a liberal state and look who's privacy could be destroyed by a "computer snafu".