Officials from the Ministry of Health have called for more
attention to the protection of the right to privacy of HIV/AIDS
patients, following a court ruling that a hospital damaged a
patient's reputation by releasing false HIV-related information
about her.
The Xinzhou Intermediate People's Court of Shanxi Province rejected
the appeal of the Xinzhou Prefectural People's Hospital against the
original ruling by a district court, in the country's first such
case.
The Xinfu District Court of the city accepted the case last August
and ordered the hospital to publicly apologize to the plaintiff, Yu
Meifang, and pay her 20,000 yuan (US$2,400) in compensation for the
anguish and humiliation she suffered.
Yu, a 41-year-old retailer who sold goods in the Xinzhou Shopping
Center, sued the hospital for damaging her reputation by releasing
false HIV-related information about her.
In
February 2000, Yu went to the orthopedics section of the hospital
for treatment. A doctor from the hospital tested her blood and
suspected her of being HIV-positive.
The hospital separated her from other patients immediately and
informed both the Xinzhou Epidemic Prevention Station and the
shopping center.
Yu
went to the Beijing 301 Hospital in March for testing and found out
she was in fact HIV-negative.
She then took the case to the Xinfu District Court and won a
judgment against the hospital. However, the hospital continued to
maintain that it had not damaged the reputation of the plaintiff
and appealed to the intermediate court.
Finally the intermediate court affirmed the original judgment of
the district court, saying the hospital and the epidemic prevention
station had, indeed, spread false information about Yu's HIV/AIDS
diagnosis and damaged her reputation.
An
official with the district court, Wang Shiping, said the hospital
should have kept Yu's medical record a secret even if she had
turned out to be HIV-positive.
An
official of the ministry's Law and Supervision Department, who
refused to give his name, said that according to regulations, all
people including doctors, are forbidden to give out the name,
address or other information about HIV carriers and AIDS
patients.
The regulation on supervision and management of HIV/AIDS, which was
issued by the ministry in 1987, also said all people, including
doctors, are forbidden to discriminate against HIV/AIDS victims and
their relatives.
The intermediate court said the hospital and the station had not
respected Yu's privacy.
Yu
said the shopping center refused to rent counters to her and nearly
everybody in Xinzhou thought she was an HIV carrier. The gossip
even led her business partner in Taiyuan to cut off relations with
her.
(China Daily 07/17/2001)