Pacific Views

US Justice Dept. goes after Planned Parenthood records.

The US Justice Department has issued subpoenas for records of abortions performed by Planned Parenthood. The subpoenas were served on Planned Parenthood affiliates in San Diego, Los Angeles, New York City, Washington, D.C., western Pennsylvania, and the Kansas/mid-Missouri region. Records for hundreds of women who have had abortions in the past 12 months are involved.

A Planned Parenthood spokesperson called the subpoenas 'a sweeping invasion into medical privacy.' Planned Parenthood is the largest provider of women's reproductive health services in the US.

Asked about patients' privacy rights, [Attorney General John] Ashcroft insisted the Justice Department was taking "every precaution possible" to "mask identifying characteristics of patients and to expunge, if you would, the identifying names and addresses, those kinds of things."

But Planned Parenthood officials say that patients' identities can be ascertained from medical records even if names and addresses are expunged. Less than 10 percent of the procedures the organization and its affiliates perform are abortion-related, they say, and they fear the subpoenas will scare away their patients.

"The women who come to Planned Parenthood are now going to be afraid that their medical records and procedures are not going to be private," said Jatrice Martel Gaiter, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington, D.C., one of the subpoenaed affiliates. "They are going to stop coming. They are going to stop getting reproductive health services that include breast exams, Pap smears and HIV testing and counseling."

Via ABC News (US).