Originally published at: Indiana AG still harassing the doctor who gave a 10-year-old rape victim life-saving medical care | Boing Boing
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These GOP-run states certainly seem determined to chase physicians away. Perhaps they’re assuming that evangelical faith healers will fill the gap in the future.
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Sounds like they’re attempting to “disrupt” the healthcare industry
Docs move out, faith healers in, then the real profit begins.
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It also seems like that dog is determined to catch the car. If Rockita succeeds in proving the 10 y.o.’s privacy was violated, it re-establishes the original grounds for Roe - patient privacy.
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I don’t see how this could be a HIPAA violation since the patient’s name, DOB, address or SS# were never mentioned.
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Am I right in understanding that the issue is that it became public that a 10-year-old needed an abortion due to rape, and so what is infuriating the GOP is the fact that the wider public get to know that 10-year-olds sometimes need abortions, instead of privately sweeping a “family matter” under the rug like they’re supposed to do?
They’re grasping at HIPAA straws because they think “Privacy! Privacy is when we don’t tell anyone that rapes happen, we just disappear our daughters for a few days.”
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Any identifying information is off-limits under HIPAA without written patient consent. It can be as simple as age, sex, date of treatment, hospital and doctor. That’s enough information for someone to identify the patient.
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Ah, noted. Well it sounds like the girl’s provider might be in a bit of a mess then.
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What the AG is trying to do with HIPAA happens about 0.1% as often as charges are brought like the ones against Hunter Biden. He’s a sick fuck who obviously doesn’t have any daughters.
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That AG needs to permanently lose its job. Can’t a lawyer be disbarred for harassment?
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Not likely. Government lawyers are typically only disbarred for things like falsifying evidence in a death penalty trial. Decisions about who to prosecute are given a lot more leeway. The AG is insulated from disbarment because he’s an REMF who doesn’t go to trial. Depending on how the Indiana State Bar leans, and if someone files a complaint, they might reprimand him or put enough pressure on behind the scenes to convince him to quietly drop the matter once he’s squeezed enough political theater out of it.
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It’s a legal catch-22 for the AG, though. If the state’s anti-abortion law caused a provider to violate a patient’s privacy under HIPAA, it directly undermines Dobbs and could trigger a new review all the way up to SCOTUS.
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Excellent point.
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Interesting follow-up on this
Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita has been charged with three counts of attorney misconduct by the Indiana Supreme Court Attorney Disciplinary Commission, which said comments he made about Indianapolis OB/GYN Caitlin Bernard caused “irreparable harm” and “burdened the court system.”
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Specifically, the commission said the attorney general violated state confidentiality laws by publicly speaking about his office’s investigation into Bernard prior to filing the administrative complaint with the Medical Licensing Board of Indiana.
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Wow, that’s pretty assertive. I hope I stand corrected about the likelihood of real discipline.
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