The sexual partners of persons who have HIV tests may be able to find out the results under the Freedom of Information Act, a seminar in Dublin was told yesterday.
Ms Eithne Fitzgerald, of the Labour Party, who drafted the Act as a minister of State, said it allowed for the disclosure of personal information to third parties where this was necessary to avoid a serious and imminent danger to the life or health of an individual.
A spokesman for the Irish Medical Organisation later said that the issue was "fairly explosive" for doctors who could be sued by patients for breaching confidentiality.
Ms Fitzgerald was speaking at a freedom-of-information seminar organised by the Irish Association of Social Workers. The Act has applied to Government Departments since April and will apply to local authorities and health boards from October 21st.
A hospital social worker had asked Ms Fitzgerald what would happen if the partner of a person who was HIV positive asked, under the Freedom of Information Act, for the results of that person's test.
Ms Fitzgerald said the hospital would first ask the patient to consent to the giving of the information. However, the patient could not veto the provision of information because the interests of the health of the individual overrode other considerations.
But a barrister, Ms Teresa Blake, said a doctor would be most unwise to breach confidentiality without obtaining legal advice.
The issue of the duty of a health-care professional to warn another person of a risk to their life as a result of information disclosed in a doctor-patient relationship involved considering and weighing competing constitutional rights.
It was preferable that people who were HIV positive be counselled to inform their partners of their status themselves and she believed it would be most unusual for a situation to arise in which this did not happen.
Mr Conal Devine, of the Irish Medical Organisation, said doctors who breached confidentiality were in danger of being sued. Doctors were "absolutely adamant" that information given by a patient could only be given by them to another medical professional.