As the Bureau of National Health Insurance prepared to issue its new National Health Insurance integrated-circuit (IC) cards today, PFP lawmaker Kao Min-chien (
"There is no point in pushing for the flashy and wasteful IC cards so hastily, especially when the [National Health Insurance] program is still in extreme financial difficulties," Kao said.
Kao made the comments yesterday, inviting leaders of civil rights groups and labor unions to protest against the government's hasty implementation of the cards.
The cards will be issued today to residents of Taipei, Taichung, Kaohsiung and Penghu.
An IC card contains a dime-sized microchip that can process and store thousands of bits of electronic data. Credit-card companies sometimes use the cards, considered more secure than standard magnetic-strip cards.
The health insurance cards that have been used until now are paper cards that have spaces on the back to record up to six clinic or hospital visits. Once the six spaces have been filled up, a new card must be issued.
The IC card, however, will be issued to the bearer for life, and render obsolete the current Child's Health Handbook, Catastrophic Illness Certificate and the Prenatal Exam Handbook.
The card will store the bearer's medical records and details of his or her health expenditure and be used in conjunction with a secret personal identification number (PIN).
The Bureau of National Health Insurance spent about NT$4 billion on the first batch of 20 million IC cards, which cost about NT$200 per card to produce.
"Is it necessary to spend so much on the IC cards when the bureau is actually asking people to face a hike in both treatment fees and premium rates to save the debt-ridden health-insurance system?" Kao asked.
Others at the press conference said that placing medical records on the IC card would invite infringements of patient privacy.
"With hackers everywhere, passwords will be insufficient to protect patients' records. Who is going to monitor the users and ensure patient privacy," said Lee Ju-li (李汝禮), former chairman of the Medical Practitioner's Association (中華民國開業醫師協會).
But Liu Tsai-chuan (劉在銓), a manager at the bureau, told the Taipei Times, "The PIN is safe enough because to view medical records, it is not enough simply for the patient to enter his or her PIN. The doctor also has to enter a code."
Chang Wei Li (張維理), chairman of the Taiwan AIDS Patients Rights Association (中華民國愛滋病感染者權益促進會), said that without proper measures to safeguard medical records, AIDS patients might be reluctant to seek treatment "for fear of having their AIDS status recorded on the IC card."
Liu said the bureau's plan to issue IC cards would go ahead despite the criticism. Liu added that an ethics committee was studying privacy issues related to the cards.
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