Category «Health Care»

Facebook Is Receiving Sensitive Medical Information from Hospital Websites

“Experts say some hospitals’ use of an ad tracking tool may violate a federal law protecting health information By Todd Feathers, Simon Fondrie-Teitler, Angie Waller, and Surya Mattu – A tracking tool installed on many hospitals’ websites has been collecting patients’ sensitive health information—including details about their medical conditions, prescriptions, and doctor’s appointments—and sending it …

Subjects: E-Records, Health Care, Privacy, Social Media

Warren, Wyden, Murray, Whitehouse, Sanders Introduce Legislation to Ban Data Brokers from Selling Americans’ Location and Health Data

Bill Text (PDF) | One-Pager (PDF) – “United States Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) introduced the Health and Location Data Protection Act, legislation that bans data brokers from selling some of the most sensitive data available about everyday Americans: their health and location data. The legislation is cosponsored by Senators Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Chair of the …

Subjects: Congress, Government Documents, Health Care, Legal Research, Legislation

How strong is your Covid immunity?

NBC News: “A newly developed blood test that measures a specific immune response in the body could help doctors gauge how much protection a person has against Covid-19, according to a new study. The test, which focuses on the part of the immune system that confers long-term protection by prompting the body to “remember” the virus, …

Subjects: Health Care

Genetic paparazzi are right around the corner, and courts aren’t ready to confront the legal quagmire of DNA theft

Via LLRX – Genetic paparazzi are right around the corner, and courts aren’t ready to confront the legal quagmire of DNA theft – Liza Vertinsky and Yaniv Heled, are law professors who study how emerging technologies like genetic sequencing are regulated. They believe that growing public interest in genetics has increased the likelihood that genetic …

Subjects: Health Care, Legal Research, Medicine, Privacy

Most of the World Breathes Unsafe Air, Taking More Than 2 Years Off Global Life Expectancy

Air Quality Life Index, June 2022 Annual Update By Michael Greenstone, Christa Hasenkopf and Ken Lee: “During the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic, the world’s economy slowed. Yet, the global annual average particulate pollution (PM2.5) was largely unchanged from 2019 levels. At the same time, growing evidence shows air pollution—even when experienced at very …

Subjects: Climate Change, Environmental Law, Health Care

Long-Term Decline in US Abortions Reverses, Showing Rising Need for Abortion as Supreme Court Is Poised to Overturn Roe v. Wade

“The long-term decline in abortions in the United States that started 30 years ago has reversed, according to new data from the Guttmacher Institute — [see also supplemental data tables] underscoring that the need for abortion care in the United States is growing just as the US Supreme Court appears likely to overturn or gut …

Subjects: Civil Liberties, Courts, Government Documents, Health Care, Legal Research

Measuring the Life-Saving Effects of Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions in the U.S.

Climate Impact Lab: “As we face the punishing impacts of global climate change it can be easy to wonder, do efforts to reduce emissions by individual countries, states or cities really make a difference? Research by the Climate Impact Lab, which measures the economic and social costs of climate change, can help answer this question. …

Subjects: Climate Change, Economy, Energy, Environmental Law, Health Care

Firefox rolls out Total Cookie Protection by default to all users worldwide

Mozilla Blog, June 14, 2022 – “Take back your privacy.  Starting today, Firefox is rolling out Total Cookie Protection by default to all Firefox users worldwide, making Firefox the most private and secure major browser available across Windows, Mac and Linux. Total Cookie Protection is Firefox’s strongest privacy protection to date, confining cookies to the …

Subjects: E-Commerce, E-Records, Economy, Education, Financial System, Health Care, Internet, Privacy, Search Engines

Adults living with gun owners significantly more likely to die by homicide, especially if they are female

Source: Homicide Deaths Among Adult Cohabitants of Handgun Owners in California, 2004 to 2016: “Although personal protection is a major motivation for purchasing firearms, existing studies suggest that people living in homes with firearms have higher risks for dying by homicide. Distribution of those risks among household members is poorly understood. Objective: To estimate the …

Subjects: Health Care, Legal Research

How Did Guns Get So Powerful?

The New Yorker – Decade by decade, firearms have become deadlier—and tightened their grip on our collective imagination – “The guns that today’s Americans buy and sell by the millions are perfectly suited for that purpose. Civilian AR-15s differ from military versions because, in 1986, the Firearm Owners Protection Act banned the transfer or possession of …

Subjects: Education, Health Care, Legal Research

K-12 School Shooting Database

“The K-12 School Shooting Database research project is a widely inclusive database that documents each and every instance a gun is brandished, is fired, or a bullet hits school property for any reason, regardless of the number of victims, time, day of the week. The School Shooting Database Project is conducted as part of the …

Subjects: Education, Government Documents, Health Care, Knowledge Management, Legal Research

You agreed to what? Doctor check-in software harvests your health data

Washington Post: “…There’s a burgeoning business in harvesting our patient data to target us with ultra-personalized ads. Patients who think medical information should come from a doctor — rather than a pharmaceutical marketing department — might not like that. But the good news is, you have the right to say no. I’ll show you what …

Subjects: E-Records, Health Care, Privacy