Former Polish Minister of Health Adam Niedzielski was sentenced to three months in prison on Friday, suspended for two years, for publishing sensitive data. The Warsaw Court ordered him at the same time pay the victim compensation in the amount of 5,000 zlotys (approximately 1,173 euros) a pay court costs. The judgment is not final. TASR informs about it according to the report of the PAP agency.
Niedzielski acted as head of the Department of Health in 2020-23 now in the government of the opposition party Law and Justice (PiS). The judgment against him concerns two of his posts on the X social network of August 4, 2023. He published them after the private Polish television station TVN broadcast a report in which a doctor complained about difficulties in issuing electronic prescriptions for patients. He claimed that the problems were due to changes in the regulations of the Ministry of Health.
The then minister Niedzielski subsequently published on the X platform doctor’s personal data along with the claim that medicines, to which the restrictions applied, prescribed on his own behalf. Niedzielski initially defended his actions, which angered doctors and politicians, but shortly after this episode resigned. The prosecutor’s office indicted him accused of exceeding the powers of a public official by that published sensitive data of an identified personobtained from the medical information system.
“We are convinced that the punishment is adequate to the degree of guilt and the prosecution will not appeal in this case,” said the spokesman of the District Prosecutor’s Office in Warsaw on Friday on the sidelines of the court verdict. According to the PAP, the doctor in question also expressed his satisfaction with the sentence he received not only the personal, but above all the public dimension. “It’s an important signal for politicians, isn’t it if they abuse public functions against citizens, they must face the consequences,” stated.
