Aetna insurance company reportedly sent thousands of customers letters that revealed their HIV-positive status through a small window on the envelopes.
Aetna officials said the letters, sent to about 12,000 people on July 28, were intended to inform customers of a change in pharmacy benefits. Text visible through the envelope windows included customers’ names and suggested a change in how they would fill their HIV medication prescriptions, according to Stat News and other news outlets.
A company spokesman said Aetna is notifying state and federal authorities about the breach, adding that the company “sincerely apologize(s)” to those affected by the mailing mishap. “This type of mistake is unacceptable, and we are undertaking a full review of our processes to ensure something like this never happens again,” spokesman said.
Aetna sent letters to those affected, saying that the information was visible “in some cases,” and that the letter “could have shifted within the envelope in a way that allowed personal health information to be viewable through the window,” but that “the viewable information did not include the name of any particular medication or any statement that you have been diagnosed with a specific condition.”
But Sally Friedman, legal director for Legal Action Center in New York City, said that in every example they had seen, the information — name and diagnosis — were clearly visible.
Friedman said her agency had talked to a number of people who have been “devastated” by the mailing, and many who said this letter was how their family members found out about their HIV status.
Legal Action Center and AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania have called on Aetna to stop the mailings and fix the problems, noting that they had heard from Aetna customers in Arizona, California, Georgia, Illinois, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C.
Freidman also said that her agency is working with attorneys from eight other organizations to possibly pursue legal action against the insurance company.
