While the Centre is pushing for a major transformation in the healthcare sector with introduction of digital health id for citizens, a large number of people have expressed apprehensions about the data security of the patients and the nature of information sought from the individuals.

After a draft policy on National Health Data Management was released on August 26, 2020 and put up for stakeholders’ feedback, independent community social media platform LocalCircles conducted a survey, which received 34,000 responses from citizens residing in 272 districts.

The survey reveals that 82 per cent of the respondents support the creation of digital health ID provided it only seeks and stores health related information. A majority of the people are not willing to share sensitive personal details such as banking information, sex life, caste, religion, political affiliation, etc as has been mentioned in the draft of the policy.

Data storage

Even though, the main objective is stated to provide guidance and creating a framework for secure processing of personal data of individuals who are a part of the national digital health ecosystem, there is a lot of apprehension around the nature of information being collected as part of the health ID.

Unlike Aadhar, which has all of its citizen data stored centrally, the Government in the draft National Health Data Management Policy proposes to storing the data selectively at three levels i.e. central, state or UT and at the health facility level, i.e. at the hospital level.

The LocalCircles survey found that 57 per cent of the respondents want data to be stored only at central level with authorisation needed for use by health facility.

The key concern among people with information storage at state level or at a health facility level is the risk of information getting compromised, informed Sachin Taparia, one of the founders of LocalCircles.

Data misuse

Taparia also cautions of the possible misuse of the patient data by the industry or fraudsters making the public vulnerable to frauds and targeted marketing campaigns.

“The digital health ID is the need of the time and going forward it will be much useful even for the rural India, where you don’t have access to quality healthcare. With this facility, they are able to share their digital health IDs and access the service of any physician or expert from a noted hospitals in any metro or big city while sitting at their homes somewhere in remote districts. Only thing is that right controls have to be put in place so that it doesn’t get misused and data is not put into the hands of the industry,” Taparia stated.

The survey had 72 per cent respondents men, while 28 per cent respondents were women. As many as 54 pe rcent were from Tier-1 cities, while 24 per cent were from Tier-2 and 22 per cent from smaller towns.

Related Topics