Keeping Track of What’s Important
At a town hall meeting this month,President Obama talked about his “investment” in electronic medical records:
When everything is digitalized, all your records — your privacy is protected, but all your records on a digital form — that reduces medical errors. It means that nurses don’t have to read the scrawl of doctors when they are trying to figure out what treatments to apply. That saves lives; that saves money; and it will still ensure privacy.”
Really? It will “ensure privacy”?
Anyone who feels confident that the government is competent enough to control and protect your medical records should check out these two recent developments. Salon.com reports that Arlington National Cemetery, which calls itself “our nation’s most sacred shrine,” is having difficulty keeping track of the dead.
“Despite nearly 10 years and countless dollars spent on computerizing its operations, the cemetery still relies mostly on paper burial records that in some cases do not match the headstones. ‘There are numerous examples of discrepancies that exist between burial maps, the physical location of headstones, and the burial records/grave cards,’ the cemetery admitted in a 2008 report to Congress.”
And then there was the news that NASA admits it probably erased the historic video of the first steps on the moon:
“It’s unclear exactly what happened to the Apollo 11 tapes, but (NASA engineer Richard) Nafzger said they likely were saved for a few years and then erased and recorded over, something that is not unusual for space missions.
As for why someone failed to recognize the historical significance and save the tapes, he didn’t have a good answer. ‘Boy, do we wish they’d done that,’ he said.”
So do we.
Tags: health care reform, obamacare, President Obama, united states
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