China's health authorities have filed reports with police after the personal information of at least 388 Chinese people living with HIV was allegedly leaked.
According to an announcement on the official website of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention on Sunday, they have received tip-offs from many HIV-positive persons saying that they received several scam calls from people posing as governmental officials and suspected that their personal information had been divulged.
The center said it has alerted police and encrypted the information because it is illegal to disclose the personal information - including the names, addresses and names of family members - of people living with HIV without their permission.
"A total of 388 persons have received scam calls in 31 provinces as of 4 pm [Monday]," Bai Hua, the head of Baihualin National Alliance, a nongovernmental organization that aims to provide assistance to people living with HIV, told the Global Times.
A total of four people have been defrauded of between 700 yuan ($104) and 6,700 yuan by the fraudulent officials, who promised the patients that they would receive 6,800 yuan in subsidies after paying an initial commission charge, Bai said.
"Some HIV-positive persons told me that the scammers knew their names, addresses, the time when they were diagnosed, even the special disease control center and the doctors who prescribed them medicines," said Bai, adding that the leak not only threatens patients' personal lives, but also damages trust between health authorities and patients.
According to a press release issued Monday by the World Health Organization and the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS, the apparent leak of patients' personal information is a violation of the fundamental right to patient confidentiality.
The confidentiality of the personal and health information of anyone seeking HIV or other medical services must be safeguarded, the release said. It added that the right to confidentiality of personal information is especially important in the HIV response, because fear of lack of confidentiality can deter people from getting tested for HIV and from accessing both HIV treatment and prevention services.
By the end of 2013, 810,000 people in China had been diagnosed with HIV/AIDS, according to the National Center for AIDS/STD Control and Prevention.
