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Tuesday, January 24, 2006

Ind. Law - More on: Bill would limit access to birth, death records, pitting freedom of information against privacy concerns

This ILB entry from Jan. 17th included this quote from the Indianapolis Star:

Birth and death records now open to the public would be closed under a bill proposed in the Indiana House, pitting freedom of information against privacy concerns.

House Bill 1067 would make it harder for someone to retrieve another person's birth or death information unless they are a relative of the person listed on the record, a member of the media or someone researching genealogy. Others would have to get a court order to gain access to the records.

A story Saturday in the Greenfield Daily Reporter, by Eric North, reported:
A bill filed by a Hancock County lawmaker is drawing a lot of attention for the restrictions it would place on access to certain health records.

Government watchdog groups this week quickly attacked House Bill 1067, which would limit the information available to the public from government birth and death records. Its author, Rep. Bob Cherry, R-Greenfield, defended it as a way to protect people from identify theft. * * *

“The information to be blocked could be valuable to the community,” said Steve Key, general counsel to the Hoosier State Press Association. “This law would block a reporter’s ability to research the cause of death in an accident while working on a story.”

Key said the information, including the cause of death, is critical in the media’s investigation of stories, for example, involving environmental contamination of an area where several residents die of the same ailment.

“If a reporter was looking to document for the cause of death of a group of people who might live in a certain area where a chemical spill occurred many years ago, this change would make that impossible to get the kind of human data that is necessary to do such work,” Key said.

Another example: Groups that compile mortality data on victims of cancer and other diseases would be blocked from such study.

The Indiana Coalition for Open Government, another group that advocates open records, echoed Key’s concerns.

“The public should be allowed access to such records to be informed on the issues,” a spokesman said.

Those who work on genealogy records locally say it is another erosion of the information they need to continue their work.

“It is hard enough to get records now,” said Mary Hoss, a past president of the Hancock County Genealogical Society.

Experts say the death and cause of death as well as birth and parental information is critical in preparing a family history. “A lot of the records don’t contain much information anyway, and now they want to limit on what is on them further.”

The bill has been assigned to the House Committee on Public Health, but has not yet been set for a hearing.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on January 24, 2006 10:34 AM
Posted to Indiana Law