LOS ANGELES – As part of its ongoing campaign to protect the health of adult film performers and require condoms in adult films produced in California, AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) has sent a letter to state and federal health agencies asking for an investigation into the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation’s (AIM) routine practice of violating performers’ privacy rights by disclosing highly confidential HIV & STD test results to porn producers in order to be cleared to work.

The letter, addressed to Michael Kruley, Regional Manager, Office for Civil Rights (a federal agency under the US Department of Health and Human Services that enforces HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act); Alex Kam, California Office of Health Information Integrity Enforcement Unit; and James L. Lawson, Ph.D., RN, Los Angeles’ Health Facilities Inspection Division, states:

“We are very concerned about the rise in sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) among adult film actors in Los Angeles – a rise due to the adult film industry’s lack of respect for the actors’ health and safety rights, as well as to local and state agencies’ failure to enforce these rights… We write this letter to draw your attention to one contributor to the problem – a clinic called the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation, Inc. (AIM), run by Dr. Colin Hamblin and located at 4630 Van Nuys Boulevard, Sherman Oaks, California 91403-2915.

“As we understand it, adult film producers have conferred on AIM a virtual monopoly with respect to STD testing. An actor who wants to work in the industry first needs to be tested at AIM. Before testing, AIM requires the actor to agree to waive all confidentiality with respect to his or her test results, which AIM then publishes on a website where the highly confidential test results can be viewed by producers.”

“AIM testing is a fig leaf that does not protect actors from the risks of unprotected sex during filming,” said Michael Weinstein, President of AIDS Healthcare Foundation. “It is simply a ploy to deflect public scrutiny and government regulation – a ploy that is perpetrated at the expense of the actors’ privacy rights, which would not be violated if the industry simply required actors to use condoms.”

Although AIM apparently routinely shares confidential performer health information with adult film producers via the internet, the agency has fought vigorously in court to prevent government health regulators such as Cal OSHA from receiving the very same information, citing patient privacy concerns.

Added Weinstein: “AIM’s hypocrisy is clear: AIM argues that patient privacy rights prevent it from cooperating with public health officials who seek to protect the health of adult film performers. But when profit is at stake, performer privacy seems no longer to be AIM’s concern.”

AHF’s letter is one of several actions the organization has undertaken recently in response to the ongoing epidemic of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) in California’s adult film industry. According to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (LADPH), workers in the adult film industry are ten times more likely to be infected with a sexually transmitted disease than members of the population at large. LADPH documented 2,013 individual cases of chlamydia and 965 cases of gonorrhea among workers between the years 2003 and 2007. LADPH has observed that many workers suffer multiple infections, with some performers having four or more separate infections over the course of a year. In addition, LADPH has stated that as many as 25 industry-related cases of HIV have been reported since 2004.

“We believe adult film actors, like all workers in California, are entitled to a safe, healthy work environment,” said Tom Myers, General Counsel for AIDS Healthcare Foundation. “It is disturbing to see this disregard for performers’ privacy rights but, unfortunately, it appears to be part of a pattern of disregard by the adult film industry for the health and safety rights of performers. We urge these agencies to look into this matter and to take any needed action to protect the rights of these workers.”

In its letter, AHF raises specific concerns regarding AIM’s use of an Authorization to Release Test Results to obtain privacy waivers from actors: “The Authorization does not appear to conform to the requirements of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), California’s Confidentiality of Medical Information Act or its AIDS testing laws. Most disturbingly, it conditions testing on the receipt from the actor of (a) an overbroad, irrevocable consent to disclosure of the actor’s STD test results by AIM to whomever AIM feels appropriate, in perpetuity, and (b) an indemnification of AIM for any damages resulting from its disclosures. The Authorization is essentially a waiver of privacy rights that is against public policy (Civil Code § 56.37). Disclosures of testing results pursuant to such an invalid authorization would therefore appear to breach the actors’ privacy rights.

Read more: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/ahf-calls-for-investigation-of,1178037.shtml#ixzz0gTX8R8qD