House debates
Thursday, 29 November 2018
Questions without Notice
Health Care
2:29 pm
Kerryn Phelps (Wentworth, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
My question is to the Prime Minister. Many Australians are concerned about the privacy of their health data, as there is no more important or sensitive personal information. Despite improvements in privacy protection passed by this House this week, there remains massive scope for the monetisation of this data through third-party use. Will the Prime Minister guarantee to provide the business case for the My Health Record database to this House in this sitting fortnight? This will be the final opportunity before the opt-out period ends on 31 January 2019, and the Australian people need to be assured about the true intentions of this program.
Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I thank the member for her question. I'll ask the Minister for Health to respond.
Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I want to acknowledge and congratulate the member for Wentworth on her election and also thank her for joining many members of the House this morning at the World AIDS Day breakfast, where a new medicine, Juluca, for over 860 patients with HIV was announced, and new self-testing equipment, for the first time, was there. With the member for Wentworth's history, I particularly acknowledge that.
Legislation in relation to My Health Record was passed unanimously through this House on Monday this week. I am very happy to inform that that included a guarantee that My Health Record would be in public ownership forever. There is no scope for revenue; there will be no revenue raised. I have confirmed again today with the deputy secretary in charge of financial matters within the Department of Health that no revenue has been projected from My Health Record. I'm happy to provide a guarantee that there is no capacity, there is no projection and there is no revenue anticipated. I'm also happy to provide the very documents which she is seeking.
The way it's framed by the Australian Digital Health Agency are the My Health Record expansion programs benefits measurement, the benefits measurement approach and also the corporate plan. Those documents address the very issues which she raises, more broadly. I would note that the benefits are about helping the 230,000 people in Australia who have some form of medication misadventure or medication clash avoid those clashes and to ensure patients have direct access to their own records. As her successor at the AMA, the current President of the AMA, Tony Bartone, wrote only very recently, 'The electronic record can save lives'. And as the Consumer Health Forum said only yesterday:
We believe that the amended measures protecting MHR users will assure the benefits of a national health records system will reach many more people more quickly, particularly those with chronic and complex conditions who rely on an accurate record of their medication, diagnostic tests and treatment.
I think that's a perfect summary of the benefits of the record.