When Vaughan Johnstone heard about the public consultation on the proposed Mandatory Testing Act, he was cast back to a spring night in 2008.

It was the last day of May, a Saturday, and Johnstone was driving from Whitehorse to Carmacks.

"I was a little ways up the North Klondike, near Shallow Bay Road, when I saw a vehicle overturned in the ditch," he said in an interview today.

Johnstone pulled over, joining a small group of people who had already gathered at the upside down car. There were two men in the vehicle, one barely conscious, the other nearly hysterical.

"The driver was kind of out of it," Johnstone recalls. "The passenger was screaming; he was panicking.

"Most people were trying to call 911 or asking other people to call 911."

But the ambulance was taking a while and Johnstone felt he had to do something more proactive than making phone calls. So he pried open the passenger side door, "and that kinda opened the door to a big bloody mess," he says.

There was so much blood, he says, it was pooling on the ceiling of the vehicle.

"So foolish me, I thought if people are bleeding that badly, they won't last too long."

Johnstone pulled the driver out from behind the mangled steering column and crushed-in dashboard. He then crawled in to help the passenger, who was trapped by his seatbelt.

In the process, he cut his hands on the broken glass that lay everywhere, and his blood mixed with the blood on the ceiling.

"It was a big obstacle," he remembers of other people's reaction to seeing all that blood, "(but) I was concerned they were going to bleed to death; that was my priority."

By this time, more people had arrived on the scene, some of whom had first aid kits and latex gloves.

"Everyone gloved up. (Protection) was first and foremost on people's minds."

Johnstone doused his hands with antiseptic produced from one of the first aid kits, but he said it was still very obvious he had come in contact with the two victims' bodily fluids.

In spite of that, neither the ambulance attendants who eventually arrived, nor the police who questioned him about the accident, suggested he seek medical attention.

It was a couple of days later, back in Carmacks, that Johnstone realized he was on his own as far as getting information on the potential of blood-borne illnesses.

"I figured there would be some sort of procedure," he says, "something for people who had helped someone and might need to be checked out."

So he called the hospital, he called the ambulance service, he called the police and he called the Communicable Disease Centre.

His question was simple: "How do I find out if the blood I came into contact with that night has put me at risk of catching something?"

But no one would give him the answers he was looking for.

"I found out there was no way in the world I was getting the information," he recalls. "I was told I have no right to that knowledge and I have no way to get it."

Personal medical information is protected by the Privacy Act, he was told. What Johnstone wasn't told was that a doctor would have been able to access the information on his behalf.

But because he was acting on his own, and not through a doctor, he was shut out.

"I didn't care who the person was, their name or where they lived," Johnstone says. "I was just wondering what I might have been exposed to."

One worker at the Communicable Disease Centre took pity on him. She said she would see what she could find and would contact him if she discovered anything of concern.

"She never called, and my understanding was that she would if there was anything wrong."

Johnstone was tested for Hepatitis and HIV anyway. His blood work came back clean ,and if, after his upcoming six-month test it stays that way, he will be given a clean bill of health.

But he is still concerned that there are not enough protections for Good Samaritans who want some peace of mind after helping someone in need.

"I jumped in there - I took the risk - I can take the responsibility," he says. "I'm not looking for any kind of reward, but just to be treated with respect."

Johnstone thinks there should be some sort of Good Samaritan exemptions from privacy laws for situations like his.

The Mandatory Testing Act would not exempt information from protection under the Privacy Act.

What it would do is give courts the power to order someone to hand over medical information or a blood sample if requested by another person who has come in contact with the first person's body fluids.

Victims of crime, emergency personnel and citizens in Johnstone's situation would all be able to make a case under the proposed act.

In Johnstone's case, he would have still needed to go through a doctor to get the information, and there is no evidence he would have been denied access to the two men's medical details had he done so.

Critics of the act say it is a human rights infringement, and an unnecessary one at that. The vast majority of people give a blood sample on request, according to experts on both sides of the argument, and the chances of being infected in a scenario such as Johnstone's are very low.

But they are not insignificant, says Dan Cable of the Yukon's Department of Justice.

He points to one study from Public Health Canada which shows medical personnel in hospitals regularly report risky exposure to patients' fluids.

That study calls for more and better education about how medical professionals can protect themselves, a sentiment echoed by critics of the mandatory testing legislation.

Both sides also agree that the act would rarely be used. Proponents of the act, Johnstone included, say it would give peace of mind to those who most deserve it.

Critics say it is a false peace of mind that will do more harm than good.

The Mandatory Testing Act will be tabled in the Yukon legislature in the spring.

Public consultation on the document is ongoing.