Ian Mulgrew reports:
A lawsuit against the Provincial Health Services Authority over the collection and storage of B.C. and Yukon newborns’ blood has received a green light to proceed.
B.C. Supreme Court Justice Robert Sewell, however, says the suit launched last year by an anonymous couple and their kids over the until-then hidden DNA database of 800,000-plus records must be amended.
He said he thought the central issue was the use of that information without permission for other purposes than for the individual child’s health.
“I have found that there is a genuine issue for trial but that it has not been accurately pleaded in the statement of claim, Sewell said in an 11,000 word decision.
Read more in the Vancouver Sun. It seems that on at least two occasions, the database was made available in allegedly anonymized form, for research purposes. A meaningful use, perhaps, but not the use to which the parents had consented.