Farrah Fawcett Speaks Out About the Lack of Privacy at UCLA

I talk a lot about privacy and this is a good case of how laws failed to work. She had to set up her own surveillance to get to the bottom of it. Yes she does carry celebrity status, but they need their private time too. When your healthcare is suffering, and especially with the cancer and treatments she has gone through, you do not feel like having cameras flashing and every bit of your persona life exposed, those are supposed to be flashed during the good times.

What point the story does make is the fact that anyone for money can still be bought and the fact that UCLA for a long amount of time protected their employee when they had the audit trails pointing back to continued access is a mystery, as that is why we have them. In the news of late we have read about several healthcare employees who have been dismissed due to snooping. BD

For more than 2 1/2 years, Farrah Fawcett's battle with cancer has sparked a flurry of headlines for celebrity tabloids. But it has also stripped the actress of her ability to seek treatment while maintaining her privacy, she said in an interview.
In a three-hour conversation with The Times in August -- her only media interview after being diagnosed with anal cancer in September 2006 -- Fawcett denounced the National Enquirer for publishing leaked details about her illness, including some that she said were false. And she criticized UCLA Medical Center for failing to protect her medical records from snooping employees.

Despite federal patient privacy laws, no details about a celebrity's medical condition appear to be off-limits. Celebrity websites draw millions of visitors each day, and the appetite for news about ailing stars is insatiable.

Fawcett said she realized that she needed to prove her theory. So when she found out that her cancer had returned in May 2007, she deliberately withheld the news from nearly all of her relatives and friends.

In part as a result of Fawcett's experience, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law tougher penalties for institutions and individuals that violate patients' privacy.

Fawcett's condition has deteriorated since the interview -- the cancer has spread to her liver -- and she is now bedridden and has lost her hair, her longtime companion Ryan O'Neal told People magazine on May 4. Her treatment has essentially stopped, he said.

Farrah Fawcett: 'Under a microscope' and holding onto hope - Los Angeles Times