David Dias reports:
Ontario tabled amendments that will strengthen the privacy of health-care information across the province through measures such as mandatory reporting of breaches, loosened rules around prosecution, and a doubling of fines for health-care workers caught snooping.
Bill 119, which seeks to amend the 11-year-old Personal Health Information Protection Act, comes more than a year after the Rouge Valley scandal in which Toronto hospital workers were caught selling information about new parents to brokers of registered education savings plans.
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In addition, the bill lifts a six-month statute of limitations on commencement of actions against privacy violations, a narrow window that left little time for Crown prosecutors to gather proper evidence. The new law removes that impediment entirely, giving regulators and prosecutors time to assess the breach before laying charges.