The New York Court of Appeals recently ruled to enforce the privacy provisions of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) in a case where the state was seeking to compel an individual to receive mental health treatment under Kendra’s Law, a 1999 outpatient commitment law.
In 2007, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene tried to force-treat Miguel M., and – against his wishes and without a court order – wanted to use as evidence records of his two recent psychiatric hospitalizations. On May 10, 2011, the state’s highest court overturned the rulings of two lower courts, which had ruled in favor of the state. “To disclose private information about particular people, for the purpose of preventing those people from harming themselves or others, effects a very substantial invasion of privacy without the sort of generalized public benefit that would come from, for example, tracing the course of an infectious disease,” the Court of Appeals noted in its ruling.
Source: http://cts.vresp.com/c/?NationalMentalHealth/d0e7c89bdd/084cd67ede/fc5dee5df7
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