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Senator wants more details about victims of epidemics like H1N1

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  • Senator wants more details about victims of epidemics like H1N1

    Senator wants more details about victims of epidemics like H1N1


    By TONY LEYS ? tleys@dmreg.com ? January 21, 2010

    An Iowa legislator wants state public health officials to disclose more details about people who die in epidemics.

    Sen. Amanda Ragan, D-Mason City, has introduced a bill that would ease restrictions on information the Iowa Department of Public Health could release during disease outbreaks, such as the H1N1 flu epidemic.

    Iowa kept a tighter rein on information than some states did.

    Early in the outbreak, for example, the public health department described two victims as "adult males from eastern Iowa." Officials wouldn't say which counties the men were from, how old they were, when they died or why they might have been susceptible to complications from the disease.
    In a few cases, the department didn't list the victim's gender.

    As the epidemic grew, the department listed counties for victims, and it said most of them had "risk factors" that increased their chances of flu complications, but it gave few other details.

    Public health administrators said at the time that a state law banned them from releasing more information. Ragan's proposal, Senate Study Bill 3054, says the law "shall not be construed to prevent the disclosure of the county of residence, health condition, sex and approximate age of a person infected with a reportable disease."

    Ragan, the chairwoman of the Senate Human Resources Committee, said she shares health officials' desire to shield the identity of disease victims. "We don't want to talk about who it is. Privacy is still critical," she said.

    However, Ragan said, Iowans might take disease outbreaks more seriously if they knew more details about the victims. Release of such information could do more to raise public awareness than health officials' ad campaigns do, she said.
    Hugh German, a retiree from Grinnell, said he was glad such a bill has been introduced.

    German said people with chronic medical problems would be more likely to act to protect themselves if they read in their newspaper that a person with the same condition had died from the flu.

    "They kept saying these people had chronic medical conditions, but they didn't say what it was. I say, why not tell it?" said German, who said he doesn't suffer from any chronic health problems.
    "I think they ought to put out as much information as they possibly can without giving the person's name," German added.

    Tom Newton, director of the Department of Public Health, said his agency did not see the value in telling Iowans exactly where flu victims lived, how old they were or what their other health problems were.

    He said any of those details could lead to public identification of victims by people who read newspaper obituaries.

    Newton said everyone in Iowa was at risk of catching the new flu virus, so giving specific locations of the 40 Iowa deaths would not have helped anyone assess the danger.
    He also said a wide array of chronic health conditions, including obesity, asthma and heart problems, contributed to the deaths. More specifics would not have helped people judge their risks, he said.

    "We tried to put the message out that anyone with a chronic condition should be getting the vaccine," he said.

    Newton acknowledged that some other states were more forthcoming than Iowa in their descriptions of H1N1 flu victims.

    In some cases, he said, those deaths happened in big cities, with more obituaries, so members of the public would have a harder time figuring out who had died from the flu.
    "We had deaths occurring in some areas that weren't very populated," he said.

    Newton said he would work with legislators to consider ways to give the public information without violating patients' confidentiality.

    Ragan said she was open to suggestions on the issue.


    What was released

    Information released by Iowa's Department of Public Health when H1N1 flu deaths occurred:

    ABOUT THE PERSON: Victims were described as children or adults. Most often, they were identified by gender.

    LOCATION: At first victims were listed as from a certain region, such as eastern Iowa. Later, they were identified by county of residence.

    CONDITION: Victims were described as having "risk factors" or "chronic health problems," but no further details were released.


    "Safety and security don't just happen, they are the result of collective consensus and public investment. We owe our children, the most vulnerable citizens in our society, a life free of violence and fear."
    -Nelson Mandela
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