The greening of medical computing: federal policy and the information industry

Some of the most valuable medical databases in existence are created and maintained by the federal government. Yet, in most cases, to access them the user must go through expensive commercial channels. In effect this forces the user to pay for them twice--once as a tax-payer and again as a user. It is argued that computerized medical information is no longer a novelty or a luxury item and is becoming fundamental to patient care, administration, education and research. As a result these data ought not be locked up by commercial vendors, but rather should be made widely and freely available to all--especially when the information was developed with public monies in the first place.