Is RFK Jr. building a National Autism Registry? Outrage grows over medical data collection

In a new transfer to fight the rise of autism within the United States, the National Institutes of Health is now amassing personal medical information from varied federal and industrial databases to share with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for his new efforts to check autism. This will assist the federal government observe Americans with autism and hint their medical journey.
This new act has raised a livid backlash towards Kennedy Jr.’s actions, with many claiming that he’s creating an “autism registry.”

RFK Jr.’s steps in direction of autism

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According to NIH director Dr Jay Bhattacharya, the data within the registry will enable exterior researchers chosen for Kennedy’s autism research to check “comprehensive” affected person data with “broad coverage” of the US inhabitants for the primary time.
“The idea of the platform is that the existing data resources are often fragmented and difficult to obtain. The NIH itself will often pay multiple times for the same data resource. Even data resources that are within the federal government are difficult to obtain,” he mentioned in a presentation to the company’s advisors.
Bhattacharya additionally shared that data from remedy information held by pharmacy chains, personal insurer claims and smartwatches could be linked to the autism research. Patient data collected by the Department of Veterans Affairs and Indian Health Service will even be used within the research.
Alongside all this, he assured that affected person confidentiality could be protected, which has raised a lot of eyebrows within the states.

Social media backlash

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People on social media have been criticising RFK Jr.’s plans for the autism registry severely. “The Autism registry is one of the most outrageous examples of government overreach of my lifetime. Disgusting” wrote a person on X. “Starting a “disease registry” to identify disabled people is EXACTLY how the Nazi Euthanasia Program worked – it just wasn’t limited to one disability. RFK Jr. is a eugenist and you can’t convince me otherwise.” added one other.

Many even have a drawback with the formation of the registry monitoring folks’s medical historical past with out their consent. “RFK Jr.’s autism registry is a chilling overreach, tracking private medical data without consent violates HIPAA and echoes eugenics. It’s not about health; it’s about control. Stop this now” wrote an X person.
Earlier this month, Kennedy Jr. mentioned autism is a quickly rising epidemic within the US. He emphasised his rivalry that “environmental” toxins are the reason for autism charges growing within the US and he shared his plans to take care of the rising drawback with initiatives to find such purported causes.