By HAYATO MURAI/ Staff Writer
May 30, 2023 at 19:13 JST
A sample My Number Card, more formally known as Individual Number Card (Provided by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications)
Yet another mix-up has come to light in the My Number card system more formally known as Individual Number Card after at least 37 people found their details linked to health insurance data of other individuals.
In some cases, a card was linked to the data of more than one person, according to an insurance doctors’ organization.
The survey was released May 29 by Zenkoku Hokenidantai Rengokai (National Federation of Insurance Medical Practitioners Associations). It covered 2,385 medical institutions, of which nearly 60 percent, or 1,429, said they had experienced a problem with My Number cards since April.
In 67 percent of the 1,429 cases, no data was linked to the card, and in 49.7 percent there were issues with the card reader and other hardware. The survey found that 20.5 percent of the cases involved a damaged microchip on the card.
These problems led to at least 122 patients having to pay their medical fee in full at hospital counters and later request reimbursement from their insurance providers.
A senior official of the federation called for My Number cards to be kept out of the national health insurance system until the issues are fixed.
Separately, the health ministry announced there were 7,312 cases of data mix-up between October 2021 and November 2022.
They included at least five cases of unauthorized disclosure of health insurance data, including the patient’s history, payment and medication.
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