Madam, - The recent High Court decision requiring you to breach the confidential relationship between a journalist and a bearer of important information of public concern may be a useful time to remind readers that Irish law offers negligible protection to all professional confidences.
Most people believe that the confidentiality of what they say to their doctor will be respected by the law. Not in the least. Any judge, any tribunal established by the Oireachtas can summon a doctor to appear before it and compel him to answer questions. The guidance rules given by doctors by the General Medical Council specifically say that a doctor should answer such questions.
Lawyers often seek to conceal this fact by talking of "privilege". They leave out the word "qualified". And "qualified privilege" means that any judge can decide in any particular case that a doctor, under threat of imprisonment, can be required to answer any question put to him.
Protection is afforded to medical confidences throughout Western Europe and the United States. As so often, the Irish Courts obsequiously follow English practice. - Yours, etc,
Prof MICHAEL NOLAN, Harmony Drive, Dublin 4.