It's official. After 3 months of back and forth, a major medical provider has elected to drop me as a patient for not having a Google or Apple device.
It is unclear if this is legal, but it is very clearly discriminatory and unethical.
Any tech journalists or lawyers interested in this?
I would like to do anything I can to ensure this never happens to anyone else.
@BenAveling @Jennifer There are no medical devices involved.
They said they only willing to communicate, schedule, and exchange medical information with patients with their apple/google mobile app moving forward, even if it means terminating relationships with existing patients.
I even offered to show up in person for every communication, and they refused.
@lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer 1 in 3 seniors does not even own a smartphone.
I don't understand how this could be even economically feasible, let alone legal.
What's the company?
@PenguinToot @neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
wondering if that's part of the point.
I'm assuming elderly people are more expensive customers, as a health provider. From a stricly financial point of view, a measure that allows you to discriminate them while calling it a technical limitation sounds quite tempting.
(no idea whether it's legal or not anywhere, tho, but it's certainly very questionable ethically)
@PenguinToot @neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
And so you've accidentally stumbled upon the actual reason.
No medicine-for-profit company wants old people with their measly Medicare reimbursements and lots of chronic illnesses. Better to get the cases of tennis elbow paid for by employer plans.
If they can be made to exit the rolls simply by requiring use of a mobile phone, that's cost savings that goes right to the CEO's Ivory Backscratcher fund.
@RealGene
I really had the feeling this was a result of the medical company just wanting to be able to make advertising money off of their patients in addition to their fees and insurance billing but this actually seems very plausible. Perhaps it's both.
Both probably are factors in this move. The only thing for certain is that medical care is not at all about care anymore.
@PenguinToot @neilk @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
@neilk Hmmm, not possible those 1 in 3 seniors without smartphones are people they'd be happy to get rid of, then?
You haven't said which country you are based in, but under USA law, UK law, and EU law, it's called "tying" and is illegal under the anti-monopoly legislation.
This is one of the things that the #FAANG 's are being sued over right now. :D
Matt Stoller would be able to point you to someone who could help.
@BillySmith
I’m skeptical that this would be regarded as tying considering:
* the clinic gives a choice between Apple & Google
* the clinic is probably not a shareholder of Apple or Google and gains no market share by the bundling
I’m not a lawyer but that’s what I would expect the clinic to argue. Your link goes to a page with many articles. I could not find an article that covers this. If this is in fact tying, then I have some banks to sue.
(edit) Just realized you were giving a reference to a person not a particular article. In any case, I would like to find an article that covers tying in the forced-app store scenario.
@bojkotiMalbona @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
Yes, i was talking about the person. There's a number of articles that have the tying behaviour as one strand.
eg. The articles about the vertical monopoly in Professional Cheerleading.
Tying is only one of the methods used in the monopolistic approach.
@bojkotiMalbona @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
Looking at the medical devices, and the tying is done on a number of levels.
There's the tying of the phone hardware to the phone OS.
There's the tying of the phone app to the medical devices.
There's the limiting of the acceptable comm's systems between the app and the user,
ie. if you don't have a email address that comes from one of the major providers then Google will start treating all of your replies as spam.
@bojkotiMalbona @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
That last one is why all of the major tech companies are being sued, as within specific industry sectors and market niches, they've been trying to set up cartels to block out new competition.
The #RightToRepair campaigns against the John Deere company's enshittification of their tractors that penalises the tractor's owners, is another example within a different industry sector.
@bojkotiMalbona @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
The Private Equity funds that are creating regional Vertical Monopolies in the Healthcare system in the USA are also responsible for this behaviour.
As is discussed in another strand of these toots, when a healthcare system is run as a for-profit system, with a "maximising profit above all else" basis, then unprofitable patients will be dumped.
@bojkotiMalbona @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
Forcing patients to give up their rights via the use of Software Licences that are attached to mandated software, gives the healthcare companies another work-around, to denying their patient's legal rights, by reducing their access to the public courts through the use of "Forced Arbitration" agreements hidden in the software licenses.
Like i said, cartel behaviour.
@bojkotiMalbona @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
And the Justice Department agrees... :D
Attached: 1 image Apple has kept an illegal monopoly over smartphones in US, Justice Department says in antitrust suit The Justice Department has announced a sweeping antitrust lawsuit against Apple, accusing the tech giant of engineering an illegal monopoly in smartphones that boxes out competitors and stifles innovation #press https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/ap-justice-department-washington-joe-biden-microsoft-b2516435.html?utm_source=press.coop
@BillySmith
That article is strictly Apple. If @lrvick ’s healthcare provider were to force Apple only, then I think it would be a more viable case of tying although still there would be the hurdle that the healthcare provider likely has different ownership than Apple.
I would love to find a tying case made in a situation where a supplier forces a choice of Google or Apple because the world is littered with that scenario right now.
That article is about Apple, but Google are still in court. :D
There's one set of investigations running through the USA Congress, as well as the EU monitoring ofGoogle's behaviour and compliance with the updated GDPR requirements.
Same for FB. :D
Also, under UK law, there's disability accessibility requirements, hence the req's for a web interface for the NHS systems.
Cory Doctorow is another person who would be able to point you to someone who could help.
@Nonya_Bidniss @lrvick @BenAveling @Jennifer
It's also worth remembering that most of the mobile apps are just a html/web interface which uses a click-agreement wrap-around, so they can't be legally reverse-engineered, so security through obscurity.
The bonus for the service providers is that they can require the mandated use of arbitration rather than the courts through any changes in the ToS agreements.
Don't agree, and you don't get to use the service.
So... they're using a third party app to keep customer data safe? Or is this an in house app by the medical provider... Either way I'm sure that app provider has nothing but the most top notch security in place, and this totally wont end up biting them in the ass.
@tphinney @Jennifer Exactly this, and they chose to introduce it months after I became a patient, having known from the outset that I do not have or want a Google or Apple device.
I gave up my smartphone 3 years ago, and am a lot happier being disconnected when I am not at my desk. It would seem some don't consider this a valid lifestyle choice.
This is the first time anyone has refused me services for not having a phone.
@lrvick @tphinney @Jennifer I'm sympathetic. My wife has a device that doesn't require an app, but benefits from smartphone integration. At some point, I assume they will require one—and then what? I've boosted your post.
Check out KFF Health News https://www.kff.org – they are like ProPublica in writing stories that are often partnered with major news orgs.
@lrvick @tphinney @Jennifer Nothing like a medical provider electing to drop me as a patient, but last week I dropped off 3 boxes at FedEx in Walgreens and couldn't get a receipt because I didn't have a smart phone with me. They were prepaid returns worth several hundred dollars.
People are being forced to have a smart phone on their person at all times to do ordinary everyday things.
@rob11563 @lrvick @tphinney @Jennifer I get this kind of thing a lot, too.
I don't really carry my phone around with me unless I need to phone someone while not at home (which isn't often, it can wait, and other folk can wait for me).
Your phone can be nicked or damaged and it's got all that info on it and is big and expensive and everything, and it's always tempting to fiddle with it, or take photos rather than do things unmediated.
But the strangest things are suddenly not possible. There was a burger van which refused to serve me the other day. I was there, they had spare burgers, I had a kind of money they accepted, but they wouldn't serve me because I didn't have the app, literally just to order the food, and I didn't have my phone.
They're all trivial things -- I can always try to remember my phone if I know it's going to happen -- but it's weird.
My phone spends most of its time plugged into the wall at home for when I have to interact with these weird companies (until I find a competitor!)
@chiffchaff @rob11563 @lrvick @tphinney @Jennifer
The second beast forces all people—important and unimportant, rich and poor, free and slaves—to be marked on their right hands or on their foreheads, so that NO ONE MAY BUY OR SELL unless he has the mark, which is the beast's name or the number of its name.
This calls for wisdom: Let the person who has understanding figure out the number of the beast, because it is the number of a person. Its number is 666.
(Revelation of John 13:14)
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