Health insurer Aetna reportedly exposed the personal data of HIV patients across the U.S. earlier this month when mailings to the patients revealed the information through a large window on the front of the envelope.<\/p>\n
The top of the letter sent to patients July 28, according to an image taken of the envelope, shows the patients\u2019 name, address, claim number and options available to them under their health plan to fill their HIV medication prescriptions.<\/p>\n
The Legal Action Center (LAC) and the AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania (ALPP) said in a\u00a0cease-and-desist letter to Aetna<\/a>\u00a0that the insurer mailed the letters to customers taking medications for HIV treatment and to those taking a medication that helps prevent people from getting HIV, Fox 61 reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n
In the legal organizations\u2019 letter to Aetna, the groups demand that the insurer change its mailing practices to \u201censure that this gross breach of privacy and confidentiality never reoccurs.\u201d<\/p>\n
FROM ANTHEM TO AETNA, MAJOR HEALTH INSURERS ARE LEAVING OBAMACARE MARKETPLACE<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n
LAC and ALPP claim that Aetna patients reported that their family members and neighbors learned of their use of HIV medications because the information was visible to anyone who handled the envelope.<\/p>\n
Aetna began notifying customers of the breach\u00a0in letters this week, and released a statement Thursday, saying the company is reviewing the matter.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis type of mistake is unacceptable,\u201d the company reportedly said. \u201cWe sincerely apologize to those affected by a mailing issue that inadvertently exposed the personal health information of some Aetna members.\u201d<\/p>\n
The envelopes with the large window were sent to about 12,000 people last month,\u00a0Bloomberg News<\/a> reported.<\/p>\n
The patients affected were in Arizona, California, Georgia, Illinois, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C., according to the LAC\/ALPP letter.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
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Health insurer Aetna reportedly exposed the personal data of HIV patients across the U.S. earlier this month when mailings to the patients revealed the information through a large window on the front of the envelope. The top of the letter sent to patients July 28, according to an image taken of the envelope, shows the Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-196433","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196433"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196433\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}