Court Wants List of Antibiotics Abusers

The Seoul Administrative Court announced that it wants a list of among small doctor’s offices, general hospitals and special hospitals that prescribed antibiotics to patients with the common cold.

The disclosure demand applies to small doctor’s offices such as pediatrics, otorhinolaryngology and internal medicine offices in towns. Therefore, if the ruling is confirmed, a ripple effect will be felt throughout the medical industry because the misuse and abuse of antibiotics, common in the medical community, will be revealed.

The Seoul Administrative Court ruled in a lawsuit filed by People`s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy against the Ministry of Health and Welfare in favor of the defendant on January 5. The lawsuit requested the disclosure of data on how nation-wide hospitals and clinics have prescribed antibiotics to patients with colds.

The list that the court asked for is of the hospitals and clinics (top 4 percent) that overused antibiotics, and those (low 4 percent) that used lower amounts of antibiotics. The list is one of those that the Health Insurance Review Agency under the Ministry of Health and Welfare had obtained from research on the actual conditions of how Korea’s hospitals and clinics used antibiotics from 2002-2004.

The court made it clear that the disclosure of hospitals and clinics’ data on the actual conditions of antibiotic use cannot be seen as a privacy invasion or infringement on proprietary information, and that precise medical information based on the facts should be provided to the people so that the people’s understanding of and trust in the medical community could be improved.

The court added that physicians deserve respect, but that because it is the patient whose body and life is at stake, protecting the patient’s right to choose his or her own doctor and treatment is more important.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare claimed at the court that if the list is unveiled, it is highly likely that patients will judge medical institutions or distrust medical practitioners based on their antibiotic prescription rate, but the court did not accept this explanation .

Ji-Seong Jeon verso@donga.com wiseweb@donga.com