No more privacy under ObamaCare

By G. Wesley Clark, MD

Under the ObamaCare healthcare nightmare, the private details of your medical history would be made accessible to an unknown number of government bureaucrats, for supposedly legal purposes, but also for illegal snooping by thousands of government employees.

On a CBS News blog, Declan McCullagh cites specific sections of the bill that will also mandate that the Internal Revenue Service provide your tax records and returns information to the health bureaucrats as well:

Section 431(a) of the bill says that the IRS must divulge taxpayer identity information, including the filing status, the modified adjusted gross income, the number of dependents, and "other information as is prescribed by" regulation. That information will be provided to the new Health Choices Commissioner and state health programs and used to determine who qualifies for "affordability credits."

Section 245(b)(2)(A) says the IRS must divulge tax return details -- there's no specified limit on what's available or unavailable -- to the Health Choices Commissioner. The purpose, again, is to verify "affordability credits."

Section 1801(a) says that the Social Security Administration can obtain tax return data on anyone who may be eligible for a "low-income prescription drug subsidy" but has not applied for it.

Over at the Institute for Policy Innovation (a free-market think tank and presumably no fan of Obamacare), Tom Giovanetti argues that: "How many thousands of federal employees will have access to your records? The privacy of your health records will be only as good as the most nosy, most dishonest and most malcontented federal employee.... So say good-bye to privacy from the federal government. It was fun while it lasted for 233 years."

So much for the "Constitutional right to privacy" -- your privacy is only important when it serves progressive objectives, but worthless when they want to seize power.