At What Cost? An Evaluation of the Health and Human Services Proposed Rule, “Proposed Modifications to the HIPAA Privacy Rule to Support, and Remove Barriers to, Coordinated Care and Individual Engagement”

Abstract

As a final act of the Trump administration, the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS or the Department) proposed a deregulatory rule entitled, “Proposed Modifications to the HIPAA Privacy Rule to Support, and Remove Barriers to, Coordinated Care and Individual Engagement” (HHS 2021). OCR announced the proposed changes on December 10, 2020, and it was published in the Federal Register on January 21, 2021. While the Biden administration has withdrawn or proposed modifications to other last-minute Trump administration notices, it has taken no action to date on this proposed rulemaking. During the public comment period, which closed on May 6, 2021, I filed a comment on this proposal (Kaufman 2021). This article is based on my publicly submitted evaluation of the Department’s proposed rule.