Last year objections to a Nebraska bill that sought to ban gender-affirming care for anyone under age 19 ground the work of the Legislature to a near standstill. This year supporters of a companion bill restricting transgender students’ access to bathrooms and sports teams waited until the end of the session to advance it for […]

Five Ontario hospitals affected by a ransomware attack last fall say they’re mailing more than 326,000 letters to notify patients whose personal information was stolen.  The cyberattack targeted Bluewater Health, Chatham-Kent Health Alliance, Erie Shores HealthCare, Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare and Windsor Regional Hospital on Oct. 23. The hospitals say in a joint statement that except […]

The aftermath of last year’s fiery train derailment in eastern Ohio doesn’t qualify as a public health emergency because widespread health problems and ongoing chemical exposures haven’t been documented, federal officials said.  The Environmental Protection Agency never approved that designation after the February 2023 Norfolk Southern derailment even though the disaster forced the evacuation of […]

Residents of Thessalon First Nation (TFN) are looking for answers after a community nurse allegedly accessed their private records without a “legitimate reason” to do so, according to a local health agency. The TFN members were informed of the alleged mass privacy breach last week via a series of letters from Maamwesying North Shore Community […]

Lives could be put at risk if the Nova Scotia government doesn’t maintain limits on who can access sensitive medical information about patients, a sexual assault survivor told a legislature committee on Monday. Carrie Smith, of Digby, N.S., spoke out against a change in legislation she believes is too broad in giving the province access […]

Hospitals and long-term care homes spent nearly $1 billion last year to fill shifts with nurses and personal support workers from private staffing agencies, a Ministry of Health document estimates. A November 2023 staffing agency update obtained by The Canadian Press through a freedom-of-information request shows that agency use increased from 2021-22 to 2022-23 by […]

After a damning report from the Ontario Health Coalition accusing the PC government of purposely underfunding public health systems to finance the private sector, the organization’s local chapter has announced April 22 will be a day of protest at Brampton Civic Hospital to demand “Truly Universal Healthcare”.  The demonstration is currently scheduled to take place […]

A woman who blew the whistle about Facebook ignoring potential harms to users of the social media platform says proposed laws by Canada and B.C. have promise to hold tech companies to account for profiting off harmful content.  Frances Haugen, a former Facebook product manager, says big tech companies such as Facebook’s parent company Meta […]

Federal civil rights investigators are looking into whether protected health information was exposed in the recent cyberattack on Change Healthcare. The Office for Civil Rights said Wednesday that it also will examine whether Change Healthcare followed laws protecting patient privacy.  Change Healthcare provides technology used to submit and process insurance claims — and handles about […]

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (AP) — Dana Holladay-Hollifield has worked as a nurse in Alabama for years, but never was her pay as low as it was at Huntsville Hospital. She wondered what executives at the not-for-profit facility made, so she filed a public records request to find out. The hospital is governed by a public board, […]

A British Columbia Supreme Court judge says a class-action lawsuit can move forward over alleged privacy breaches against a company that made an app to track users’ menstrual and fertility cycles.  The ruling published online Friday says the action against Flo Health Inc. alleges the company shared users’ highly personal health information with third-parties, including […]

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas moved closer Thursday to requiring abortion providers to ask patients why they want to terminate their pregnancies and report the answers to the state. It would join other states with Republican legislatures that ban most abortions even though Kansas voters have affirmed abortion rights. The House approved, in an 81-39 […]