Groups give Obama high grade for medical privacy

A coalition of privacy groups gave the Obama administration a grade of A- for progress in medical privacy because of provisions in the stimulus law strengthening safeguards over personal health information. 

“The privacy language makes the bill one of the best privacy laws in years,” said Lillie Coney, associate director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)  and coordinator for the Privacy Coalition.

Besides EPIC, the coalition is made up of the Consumer Federation of America, U.S. Public Interest Group (US PIRG) and other public advocacy groups. The coalition issued a report card on the administration’s efforts on consumer privacy, civil liberties and cyber security, in addition to medical privacy, which earned the highest grade.

An informal public poll on the Web site gave the administration an F in all privacy categories. 

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act toughened privacy protections for electronic health records, including a ban on the sale of health information, requirements on the use of audit trails to identify people who have accessed health data and encryption technology to make the information unreadable to others.

The legislation also gave patients rights to access their information and required breach notification to consumers, and improved enforcement with monetary penalties,

Last month, the Federal Trade Commission finalized a rule in which online businesses that provide personal health records must alert consumers about violations to the security and privacy of their electronic health information.

The Health and Human Services Department also published a rule that requires health care providers, health plans and their business associates to alert individuals of unauthorized access to their health information as part of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act.

The report card, released Sept. 9, is online.