Medical Newsroom

Medical Privacy Regulations If Congress Missed Its Self-Imposed Deadline

Under a law passed in 1996, Congress was required to enact medical privacy protections by August of 1999. The law also included a provision that gave the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services the authority to write medical privacy regulations if Congress missed its self-imposed deadline. Congress did miss the August, 1999 deadline and President Clinton and Secretary Donna Shalala unveiled their medical privacy proposal in October, 1999. The public was invited to comment on the draft regulations and this comment period ended on February 17, 2000.

Although I have some concerns about the proposed regulations, I am pleased President Clinton and his Administration are moving forward to address the need for medical privacy. I am hopeful that the Administration will take the thousands of public comments into careful consideration, revise the draft regulation and issue a final, improved rule in a timely manner. There are a number of areas the proposed rule could not address and this reinforces my strong belief that an issue as significant and as complicated as medical privacy must be addressed by Congress and not be left solely to Administrative regulations. I will continue to push for legislative action on this important issue to Americans.