“Amazon already has huge amounts of our data — we give it to them in exchange for two-day shipping,” said I. Glenn Cohen, a Harvard Law School professor who specializes in health law policy. “But what happens when you add in actual health care data? The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) prohibits health insurance companies and other entities from sharing personally identifiable medical data. There are also federal restrictions on using medical data for marketing purposes or to make lending decisions by banks. Research shows that increased access to patients’ medical records and history reduces the cost of health care.

Source: Washington Post January 30, 2018 22:38 UTC