Though the scandalous Head of the Department of Countering Drug-Related Crime of the National Police of Ukraine, Illia Kiva, has already been dismissed, his “innovative” idea to create a “database” of all drug dependent people in Ukraine is still alive and even actively brought into life.
Patient confidentiality? Personal data protection? Presumption of innocence? Apparently, for the National Police these are just empty words, but not the inherent principles of their daily law-enforcement efforts. The society has just started forgetting the “brilliant” idea of Illia Kiva to introduce criminal responsibility for using drugs, so the Department of Countering Drug-Related Crime decided to remind about itself by starting to collect data about all patients of drug treatment clinics “due to the operational needs” to “create a database of individuals who use narcotic drugs for non-medical purposes”. [1]
Since January 2016, the Alliance for Public Health has been receiving information from the regions of Ukraine on the national policemen illegally collecting information about drug dependent individuals, allegedly as instructed by administration of the National Police of Ukraine. Until recently, there were no documented evidence of the existence of such instructions, but our partners on a regular basis informed us about the cases of visits by law enforcers to treatment institutions offering Opioid Substitution Treatment (OST), mass detention of dozens of drug dependent patients right in the territory of such medical institutions, in particular in Sloviansk, Lysychansk and other cities of Ukraine.
But one of these days Alliance got a documented proof of the existence of centralized instructions from the Department of Countering Drug-Related Crime of the National Police to collect personal data of all people registered with drug treatment centers – request of the First Territorial Administration (covering Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk and Zakarpattia oblasts) of the Department of Countering Drug-Related Crime, reference number 196/40-TU/Z-2016 dated 19.05.2016 to the chief doctor of Zakarpattia oblast drug treatment center.
This fact is an evident proof of the National Police unduly initiating centralized collection of personal information on drug dependent individuals in breach of articles 19 and 32 of the Constitution of Ukraine, articles 8 and 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights, article 286 of the Civil Code of Ukraine, articles 7, 19, 24, 25 of the Law of Ukraine “On Protection of Personal Data”, articles 39-1 and 40 of the Law of Ukraine “Fundamentals of Healthcare Legislation of Ukraine”, and articles 7, 8, 25-28 of the Law of Ukraine “On the National Police”.
Such impudent and systematic violation of human rights is intolerable in a law-governed democratic state, which, besides, is declaring rigorous compliance with the strict conditions of personal data protection, stipulated by the Action Plan on Visa Liberalization by European Union for Ukraine.
The Alliance for Public Health would like to draw the attention of all responsible persons – chief law enforcement officers, Ministry of Health, Ombudsman of Ukraine, heads of the special committees of the Supreme Council of Ukraine, other government officials as well as representatives of civil society and media – and today it officially called to immediately intervene with this situation, stop the unlawful collection of information on drug dependent individuals and initiate a complex investigation (criminal proceedings, internal investigations, etc.) based on this fact to avoid such cases in future.
At the same time, Alliance would like to bring to notice of administrations of the treatment facilities, where almost 85,000 drugs users are registered, that disclosure of personal information, in particular containing patients’ confidential data, in response to such unlawful requests is unacceptable.
For information: The Alliance for Public Health as one of co-implementers of the National Targeted Social Program of Combating HIV/AIDS in 2014-2018 approved with the Law of Ukraine No. 1708-VII dd. 20.10.2014 is responsible for implementing HIV prevention programs, which cover over 212,000 drug dependent people in our country, including more than 8,600 patients of Opioid Substitution Therapy (OST).
At the end of 2014, in drug treatment institutions of Ukraine there were 84,739 officially registered individuals with mental and behavioral disorders caused by drug abuse.
[1] Quote from the request of the First Territorial Administration covering Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk and Zakarpattia oblasts of the Department for Combating Drug Trafficking of theNational Police, reference number 196/40-TU/Z-2016 dated 19.05.2016 to the chief doctor of Zakarpattia oblast drug treatment center.