UK Health Secretary Victoria Atkins: Stop Palantir’s NHS data takeover

We call on you to:

• Cancel the plan to hand a £480 million, multi-year contract to US spy tech corporation Palantir
• Go back to the drawing board – design an NHS data platform we can trust, which keeps the NHS public, respects patient choice, and protects privacy

Background info:

The government wants to hand US spy tech firm Palantir a £480 million contract to run a new database that will likely include huge amounts of our health data held by the NHS – the “Federated Data Platform”.

Doctors, patients, and a huge range of organisations have been raising concerns about the plan and what it would mean for the future of the NHS. And it looks like the government is feeling the pressure – the former UK Health Secretary Steve Barclay reportedly delayed announcing the contract because it was so unpopular.

Now Barclay’s successor Victoria Atkins is in place as the new Health Secretary, let’s build the pressure to cancel the plan and go back to the drawing board on NHS data. We’ll be delivering this urgent petition directly to his Department for Health offices in Westminster.

This isn’t just a chance to stop something bad happening. If we manage to stop the NHS Palantir deal, then we’d have an opportunity to call for something so much better instead – an NHS data platform we can trust, which keeps the NHS public, respects patient choice, and protects privacy. But first, we have to stop the Palantir deal – so please sign the petition now.

[UPDATED 13/11/23 to be addressed to Victoria Atkins, rather than Steve Barclay, whom she replaced as Health Secretary]