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The FCC is About to Harm Millions of Patients

By Samm Anderegg posted 12-11-2017 13:23

  

The FCC is About to Harm Millions of Patients

Repealing Net Neutrality and it’s impact on the American healthcare system.

On Thursday, December 14th, the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) will be voting on an issue that hasn’t garnered enough public attention, concern, and downright outrage. Net Neutrality (with Title II classification), a consumer protection clause, is set to be dismantled. Repealing this clause will cause serious harm to the economy, the healthcare system, and patients.


What is Net Neutrality?

Net Neutrality ensures our internet service provider (ISP) allows us to access websites (e.g. Amazon, Google), streaming services (e.g. Netflix, Spotify), and applications (e.g. Facebook, Instagram) at the same speed and convenience without discrimination.

Net Neutrality enables each website or app to load without being unfairly slowed down because the host company isn’t paying our ISP extra money to increase speed of its web traffic.


Why Net Neutrality Matters

We, the consumers of these technology services, make payments to our ISPs (e.g. Verizon, AT&T, Time Warner, Centurylink, Comcast, Mediacom). Repealing Net Neutrality leaves us at the mercy of our ISP and how fast they allow each website or application to run on their network.

Forbes reports that “In 55% of the U.S., there is only one major broadband provider and in most of the remaining 45%, there are two.” That means that if the only ISP available in our area chooses to be the proverbial “bad actor,” there is no “free market” to correct their actions. We would have no other ISP option to switch to. This means our favorite TV shows may stream at less than half the speed, buffering every 2 minutes, because Netflix doesn’t pay our ISP a substantial amount of money to ensure their users have fast speeds.


How Does this Affect Me?

You can see the market hedging in preparing for this transition. Netflix recently partnered with T-Mobile so that T-Mobile customers get the streaming service for free. AT&T recently purchased DirectTV and is pushing sales of the bundled package heavily. Google started their own ISP called Google Fiber. Major companies will likely form semi-exclusive or completely exclusive partnerships with ISPs to drive their user base to a specific provider.

OK, fine, so I’ll have to be on T-Mobile to watch Stranger Things. But where does that leave the little people? The small businesses and startups that are building revolutionary digital products, creating new services and added convenience in our busy, chaotic lives — the whole reason the tech economy is booming in the United States.


Bad for Business

Net neutrality protects small businesses and strengthens our economy by giving innovative digital products a fair shot at being discovered and utilized by consumers who value their products. Given that most consumers spend an average of 30 seconds on a webpage to determine if the content is relevant to them, a slowed down connection can significantly harm a business, according to the Neilsen Norman group.

When it comes down to it, the FCC repeal of Net Neutrality will not only cause a negative impact on our daily lives, it also harms the economy. And it gets worse…


Bad for Patients

Healthcare is quickly making it’s way into the digital economy. Applications and devices like FitBit and MapMyRun are tracking and displaying our exercise and wellness data to help us improve our health and happiness. More Electronic Health Records (EHRs) are moving to the cloud, allowing us to access our medical and pharmacy records online, schedule doctor’s appointments, and refill our medications. In some states, we can even see the doctor or pharmacist by videoconference and get a prescription filled.

Digital health companies will be impacted in the exact same way as other technologies. If the FCC repeals Net Neutrality, patients may never get digital access to their health records. Your healthcare providers may not have access to the medical information they need to stay educated and treat you to the best of their ability. Critical laboratory and vitals data may not feedback to software that alerts clinicians if we’re about to have a heart attack (before it happens).

Many of the new apps and services improving health & wellness and saving money across the entire healthcare system are startups. These companies will severely suffer from


Bad for America

As part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act incentivized the universal adoption of the electronic health records (EHRs) and provided resources to promote their “Meaningful Use.” Over $35B taxpayer dollars has been shelled out to technology companies to get our medical records from paper to secure digital platforms. Think of this as the transition from high school yearbooks to the Facebook.

This would absolutely slow the rate of innovation in healthcare and erase the $35+ Billion investment the federal government made to digitize medical records.

The health tech sector is at an inflection point, and we’re about to achieve a massive returns on the monumental investment the the federal government made to improve our healthcare system. For example, the increased access to care and cost efficiency telemedicine has provided will suffer if the company is unable to pay our ISP extra to speed up our connection to the doctor’s office or pharmacy.


What You Can Do

Contact Congress

Act quickly and efficiently using Resistbot — I have no stock in this company or reason to recommend it other than it’s the best and easiest way I’ve found to contact my Congressional reps.

Text RESIST to 50409 or type“Resist” as a Facebook message.

Use this message: The FCC must keep strong Net Neutrality rules backed by Title II. If repealed, it will cause serious harm to small business, the healthcare system, and patients.


Call the FCC

Here’s an example from a concerned citizen of Dubuque, Iowa.


Spread the Word

Share this article or your favorite resource on social media. Call your family and friends to help in this effort. Find your own way to spread the word. Just act. For you, for patients, and for America.



Authors:

Farah Towfic, PharmD is a Pharmacist at Osterhaus Pharmacy in Maquoketa, Iowa.

Samm Anderegg, Pharm.D., MS, BCPS is CEO at DocStation, a patient care platform for pharmacists.

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