Privacy protection: implications for public health researchers

Recent privacy legislation and other existing controls on medical research in Australia have raised a number of issues for instituional ethics committees and medical researchers. Some legislation, such as the federal electoral laws, has made it increasingly difficult for researchers to engage in community-based case-control studies. One proposal to alleviate this difficulty is to give a body such as the Australian Institute of Health wider access to health information. This proposal is consistent with public opinion regarding privacy in the context of medical research.