Your data already shared | The Journal of Quebec

The Régie de l’assurance maladie du Québec already shares data on the health of Quebecers, as proposed by Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon, in order to provide “valuable information” to the health network, researchers and private companies.

• Read also: Providing your personal data to pharmaceuticals is a winner

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The Minister of the Economy admitted Thursday that he wanted to provide the medical data of Quebecers to pharmaceuticals. “It’s a winner,” he says, to attract businesses to Quebec and advance science.

A few hours later, the Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, argued for his part that there was no question of taking advantage of the RAMQ data.

However, according to access to information documents, the RAMQ is already using our data in an “exploratory phase” in order to make the most of the “enormous” volume of data, a large amount of which is “sensitive. ”

These data are cleaned of any personal information of a confidential nature.

However, the expert in computer security, Patrick Mathieu, points out that the data coming from “big data” is not always anonymized correctly and that there can be leaks. “The risk is data. In government, it’s rarely done well, ”he fears.

Protect information

A salary budget of $ 5 million is allocated to the 66 people who work for the Director of Business Intelligence and Analytics at the RAMQ.

They accumulate a multitude of data on health services and on drugs consumed in Quebec. It already makes them available to the Minister, stakeholders, researchers in the field of health and social services and for certain “external” requests.

“These data help provide valuable information both internally, in terms of strategic and operational management, and externally when the laws governing the Régie require or allow it,” said the document. .

The RAMQ maintains that projects can be part of the network’s service offering, as long as the protection of medical or confidential data is respected. “Failure to comply with norms and standards for the protection of personal information could be problematic for the corporate image and, at the limit, place the Minister in an embarrassing position”, underlines the document.

The Régie told the Bureau of Inquiry not to sell data to private companies, but to charge for the time inherent in the production of statistical documents.

Democratize data

Experts and government sources also argue that Quebecers’ health data must be democratized, as it can help improve the diagnosis and treatment of many diseases.

“The State produces, out of taxpayers’ sums, information which has a social, democratic and commercial value”, underlines for his part the researcher in ethics and health, Pierrot Péladeau, adding that the government must provide itself with a clear policy on access to this data.

“For companies that are going to make a profit with this, you have to invoice. And conversely, it is necessary to facilitate access to social groups and to the government. ”

Near pharmaceuticals

Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon had discussions about RAMQ data with pharmaceutical giants during his visit to the International Congress of the Biotechnology Innovation Organization in Philadelphia. The information was confirmed yesterday by Mathieu St-Amand, press secretary for Pierre Fitzgibbon.

During this meeting, the Minister also awarded a $ 15.4 million grant for the Montreal Heart Institute to pilot two projects in precision medicine in partnership with pharmaceutical companies DalCor, AstraZeneca and Bayer.

These projects notably integrate genomic data and artificial intelligence.

– With the collaboration of Francis Halin

Lots of opposition