Nineteen Republican attorneys general are asking the Biden administration to withdraw a proposed change to medical privacy laws that would ban doctors from reporting suspected abortions to law enforcement. The attorneys general argue the change would interfere with states’ authority to enforce their own abortion laws. They claim the administration is pushing a false narrative that states are treating pregnant women as criminals. The proposed rule would prevent states from investigating people who help others obtain abortions. The Republican attorneys general threaten to sue the administration if it moves forward with the proposed HIPAA rule change.

  • TheOakTree@beehaw.org
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    1 year ago

    The letter claims that the Biden administration is pushing “a false narrative that States are seeking to treat pregnant women as criminals or punish medical personnel who provide lifesaving care.”

    From the same group of people who will award you money for calling the cops on someone looking to get an abortion… nice.

  • Dee@beehaw.org
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    1 year ago

    Ugh. I’m so tired of these fascist fucks… I don’t even have anything to say anymore. It’s entirely expected behavior yet it still causes unrivaled disgust and revulsion every time they do something. I’m just so tired.

    • Chris Remington@beehaw.org
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      1 year ago

      There’s been a segment of the GOP that have, over the past decade (?), taken this path of cheating-lying-etc because they feel it’s the only way for their party to win a majority. On the other hand, there are perfectly sane and reasonable GOP party members out there. Most of the time we don’t hear about them because they aren’t causing controversies that news platforms love to cover for clicks-money-etc.

      All of this USA political bullshit and shitshow matters fuck all to me. When I learned about the 400 people that control everything on Earth, then all this shit just became ‘smoke and mirrors’.

      • Pigeon@beehaw.org
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        I’m not prepared to call anyone still associating themselves with the GOP “reasonable” at this point. That’s like joining a neo-nazi militia and claiming that you’re just a member but not a neo-nazi.

        Ditto for the people who voted for the Nazi party for “economic reasons” while turning a blind eye to… Fucking everything. They were not innocent. Very far from it. However ‘normal’ and ‘socially acceptable’ their day to day behavior may otherwise have seemed to those around them. Evil can be as banal and understated as anything.

        Past a certain point, you just can’t declare affiliation with an organization, make-nice with its ‘more extreme’ members and overlook their behavior and actions, etc, and still claim that you’re uninvolved and not participating in and enabling what the organization has become as a whole.

        Especially not when the GOP - in congress and in state houses - votes in near lockstep when it comes to their vilest culture war talking points. These supposedly “fringe” points that have such a mysterious tendency to become less and less and less fringe within the party as time passes and the line of what is or isn’t “acceptable” (or even encouraged) is shoved farther and farther out.

        Any actually reasonable members of the GOP bailed and became right-wing dems or independants or libertarians ages ago at this point.

        • ArtZuron@beehaw.org
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          1 year ago

          That’s my stance on it as well. If they still call themselves a republican, then they’re complicit. If they don’t admonish and distance themselves from the GOP, then they are complicit.

      • Baggins@beehaw.org
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        1 year ago

        Well that was depressing. I agree though. I’ve always thought that after a certain amount, nobody needs more money. Most depressing of all was that this was just Americans. There are plenty more worldwide.

  • apfoster10@beehaw.org
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    1 year ago

    They are saying that their laws should be enforced in other states, but other states cannot enforce their laws in their state.

  • xMotivee@beehaw.org
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    1 year ago

    TIL it wasn’t a HIPAA violation to do this in the first place. My understanding was that as long as it’s not self harm that literally anything else wasn’t something that could be given away without your consent.

    • JuBe@beehaw.orgM
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      1 year ago

      HIPAA only applies to a small subset of people/entities. It requires that subset to be careful with healthcare data. So if a doctor gives you a diagnosis, HIPAA requires the doctor treat that information carefully. If you share that same exact information with your electrician, and then the electrician shares that same exact information with her seamstress, your electrician has not violated HIPAA because you disclosed it to someone that isn’t considered a “covered entity.” HIPAA is far more about regulating who or where the disclosure comes from, than it is about the substance of the information.

    • FlowVoid@midwest.social
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      1 year ago

      There are several situations in which HIPAA allows doctors to disclose your protected health information without your consent. One of the exceptions involves law enforcement. Democrats are trying to close that loophole, at least for enforcement of out of state abortion laws.

      Self harm falls into the “mandated reporting” category, one of the few things that is not only unprotected but actually must be reported.