Resources for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)

Health 2.0: A Promising Prescription

www.technewsworld.com

Google's (Nasdaq: GOOG) Latest News about Google recent announcement that it is creating a home for personal health records online is a natural outgrowth of Silicon Valley's Web 2.0 consumer Internet focus. The question this raises is whether a market-driven system is better for keeping health records than one run by the government.

Groups like the World Privacy Forum worry that initiatives like Google's might threaten privacy because tech companies "are not subject to the HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) health privacy rule." This is interesting given that the WPF also seems to have a number of complaints against HIPAA, and many experts on HIPAA agree that the law is more about the portability of medical data than about privacy.

HIPAA benefits the government and big business at the expense of consumers, according to consumer advocates like Sue Blevins at the Institute for Health Freedom. "HIPAA takes power away from individuals and gives the decision to the government as to who can access your data."

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