Summary

1. There is a strong consensus on privacy protection through medical secrecy, supported in France by the Data Processing and Freedom Act (1978), the enforcement of which is monitored on a daily basis by the CNIL and by professional associations.

2. In its traditional meaning, privacy protection goes against the requirements of the community's interests, which are the basis for the limits imposed on medical secrecy for three sorts of reason : public health and sanitary safety, medical and epidemiological research, and expense control (pursuit of efficiency). States are responsible for defining the balance between both types of equally legitimate but potentially contrary concerns.

3. However, one can wonder whether the traditional approach cannot be enriched and renewed, in the very interest of individuals.

4. Indeed the individual has a concern for his/her privacy, but also for improving his/her health. Next to - or opposite - individual data protection, there is both the loss of a sanitary opportunity, and the relevance of such data.

5. The loss of a sanitary opportunity, observable during the whole life cycle, finds its origin in the concealment, sometimes old and decided in unawareness of the facts, of individual data.

6. Therefore, it is in time and space that a new balance will emerge, the scope of which is such that its outline can only result from the choice made by the individual for him/herself

7. There is an absolute ethical requirement, which is to allow the individual the permanent opportunity to make a choice, therefore : - To establish rules protecting such choice - To define choice aids, tools and protections.

Gilles JOHANNET