A serious mistake with serious consequences. A London clinic inadvertently broke patient confidentiality by disclosing the email addresses and names of 780 HIV-positive patients in a newsletter. The newsletter also provided information on the treatment provided to these people with HIV.
The author of this blunder, who forgot to erase private information before sending the newsletter, said he was upset. This clumsiness could be very detrimental to patients whose identities have been disclosed. Some of them had indeed taken care to hide their illness from those around them. This violation of medical confidentiality sometimes aroused incomprehension and sometimes anger: “I have trouble understanding how this can happen today. By receiving it, I was able to view the list of recipients and recognize the names of people. that I didn’t know were sick, ”one of the clinic’s patients told The Guardian. “Falling into the wrong hands, this list is dynamite” assures another patient, worried. One of the people mentioned in the newsletter decided to file a complaint against the clinic.
“An unacceptable mistake”
The management of the private facility, located at 56 Dean Street in London, said the “human error” was “unacceptable”, before apologizing to the patients. She asked the newsletter recipients to delete the email they received. It remains to be seen whether the instructions were followed to the letter.
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