Health Minister Zweli Mkhize has warned that the government will take decisive steps to deal with people infected with COVID-19 who refuse to provide their personal information, going as far as to publicly naming them, reports News24.
Mkhize said should a patient refuse to provide the government with personal information – including a list of contacts – it would disclose his or her name to the public. "We will go to the extent of making a public announcement that anyone who has come into contact with that specific person must present themselves."
"While we know that there is an ethical obligation not to disclose patient information, with this outbreak we will exercise Regulation 18 which states that information concerning a case, contact or a carrier of the virus may be disclosed for the purpose of public health surveillance, investigation and interventions."
The report says if the government feels the patient's infection could pose a risk to others, it could publish the his or her name to either call on their contacts to compel the patient to come forward or for those contacts to come forward themselves.
[link url="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/coronavirus-patients-who-refuse-to-provide-personal-information-to-be-publicly-outed-20200324"]Full News24 report[/link]