Name-based disaster

So, the District and Maryland are being threatened with the withholding of federal funding if HIV programs don't record and report the names of all those testing positive for the virus. While such reporting could be beneficial in coordinating programs and assuring proper notification of sexual partners, in the end it will have disastrous results.

The first concern is the detrimental effect that such removals of privacy have on general willingness to participate in government programs. There are a lot of people who have distrust of government or healthcare, and the less anonymous testing is, the less likely these people are to undergo it. In another take on the privacy angle, DC Councilman Katania recently expressed concern that such data is not safe in the hands of a federal government which has engaged in illegal surveillance of its citizens.

Another significant problem with the proposal is that it will have even more deleterious consequences for undocumented residents, who have very real reasons to avoid government detection. Even the callously self-interested and anti-immigrant cannot see this as a positive development, as the undocumented are equally capable of contracting and spreading HIV, so anything which adversely affects their tendency to get tested will endanger the lives of everyone else.

This move should be resisted.