NY To Track Diabetics: Big Brother?

According to a few reports, some from back in July:

As part of a broad new effort to better understand how diabetics manage their illness, the New York City Board of Health is ordering laboratories to pass along detailed information on individual tests that measure blood sugar levels to the city's health department.

It is the first such reporting and tracking effort in the country, and it is being closely watched by public health officials nationwide wrestling with ways to better control the epidemic of diabetes.

[...] By gathering data on the tests, the city hopes to coordinate intervention programs. Within six months, officials hope to use the information to reach out to local doctors and, in some cases, patients, to urge lifestyle changes and other measures to better control the disease.

Emphasis mine. More below the fold.

The NY Times article includes the following information:

An estimated 520,000 adult New Yorkers have been diagnosed with diabetes, according to the health department. It is thought that an additional 265,000 New Yorkers have diabetes, but do not know it. It was the fourth-leading cause of death in the city in 2003, the first time it made it into the top five.

Diabetics must control their blood sugar levels to prevent serious complications from the disease. The city wants the laboratories to report information from what are known as A1c tests, which are more detailed than the daily blood sugar tests patients perform on themselves. In the A1c tests, which diabetics are supposed to have done two to four times a year, a doctor is able to measure the average amount of glucose in the blood over a period of months.

OK, so diabetes is a big problem. They're calling it an epidemic. My mom has diabetes. I understand.

But can't we think of better ways to handle this than tracking people without their consent? The article notes that people will not be able to opt out of having their information passed on to the Health Dept. And the part about the Health Dept. directly contacting patients really irks me. My mother was the one who alerted me to this article (she lives in MN, not NY, I live in NY), and her only comment was that she wouldn't want to be a part of anything like this.

Think about it: smoking is a leading cause of illness and death. The state could theoretically require smokers to register their information when buying cigarrettes, and then target messages directly to smokers reminding them that they should quit and trying to provide assistance with quitting. That sounds to me like a pretty similar plan. But I don't think anyone would accept it. Much better to do broad advertising against smoking in general, and go after the cigarrette sellers, and try to show people the risks of their actions.

Diabetes seems a similar situation to me. It is not contagious. Diabetics pose no threat to anyone but themselves. It is their responsibility to control their blood sugar levels, not the state's. I hate sounding like a rabid libertarian here, but I just think this is the wrong solution to the problem.

If anything, this is wrong not only because of privacy concerns, but also because it's just patching the hole after the tire's already gone over the nail. Individuals should be responsible for managing their own diseases; society collectively should be concerned with education and prevention. What causes diabetes? Can we educate people about healthy diets and exercise and try to prevent the epidemic from growing, rather than just managing it as it grows?

Or am I missing something here? Is there a good, solid, progressive/liberal rational for a program like this? Is this actually an efficient, proper use of government resources and I'm just missing how this is actually the best alternative?

And furthermore, why did I have to hear about this from my mom who lives in another state? Granted I'm not the best NY citizen as far as keeping up with local politics, but it seems a major positive program like this would be publicized a bit more, that the Health Dept. would be proud of it to the point of trumpeting it all over. But I found it hard to find news articles about it.

I admit I don't know too much about this, I'm really ready to be corrected and understand why this is a good thing if I'm really just wrong. I like to think the government here isn't as misguided as my reading of these stories suggests it to be. Thanks for anyone who takes the time to put me straight, or back me up! :)