Florida healthcare reform supporters say Governor Rick Scott went too far Tuesday when he accused the federal government of using federal insurance exchanges slated to start later this year to create a government database of private information.
Governor Scott and his cabinet said they’re worried so-called insurance navigators, commissioned by the federal government to help people shop on government-run insurance exchanges, may have too much access to a taxpayers’ personal information. Scott argued although legislators passed a law regulating navigators, the federal government can still compile a federal database.
“We cannot stop the president’s plan to create a new federal database that compiles personal information on Floridians and all U.S. citizens who enter the federal healthcare exchanges,” Scott asserted.
But Karen Woodall, the Executive Director of the Florida Center for Fiscal and Economic Policy, thinks Scott is misinformed. She said a person’s sensitive information goes directly to the marketplace and won’t end up in any database.
“The information goes directly through the marketplace system to help people get enrolled in health insurance,” Woodall retorted.
Woodall pointed out that Floridians already use their personal information to sign up for social programs such as Kid Care and she notes the governor has urged citizens to sign up for unemployment benefits in much the same way navigators would enroll people in health insurance.