By Katie Gu
Mifepristone’s shifting legal terrain may soon raise new privacy considerations regarding telemedicine data collection, security, and disclosure.
Authors
Katie Gu is a second-year student at Harvard Law (JD 2024). Her current research examines the interplay between data privacy and reproductive healthcare access. She has previously published articles on synthetic biology regulation and governance, end stage renal disease payment reform, and comparative analyses of learning disorder policy. Currently, she co-leads the Harvard Health Law Society and serves on the editorial board of the Harvard Journal of Law and Technology.
South Carolina’s Abortion Debates: A Game of Ping Pong
By Katie Gu
On January 5, the South Carolina Supreme Court permanently struck down Senate Bill 1 (S.B. 1), also known as the Fetal Heartbeat and Protection from Abortion Act, which banned most abortions after the sixth week of pregnancy. The decision was issued just five days before the state’s General Assembly returned for 2023, setting into motion a game of ping pong between the state branches of government in South Carolina’s abortion debates.
Lessons in Health Data Privacy from the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act
By Katie Gu
The past may hold important lessons for our uncertain future of health privacy for patients, physicians, and hospitals in the face of abortion subpoenas post-Dobbs.
In returning the legality of abortion back to states, the Supreme Court’s decision has paved the path towards greater surveillance of sensitive health data contained in patient medical records. This stark increase in privacy risks for individuals seeking reproductive care resembles the shifts in patient privacy protections nearly twenty years ago following the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act (PBAB).
Physician-Led Advocacy for the Future of Reproductive Health Care
By Katie Gu
The American Medical Association (AMA) recently adopted new policies aimed at protecting access to reproductive health care and reducing government interference in medical practice. As the nation’s most prominent professional medical association, the AMA’s unified stance brings a stronger physician-led voice in reproductive health care advocacy in the aftermath of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Care Organization.
The New Search for Reproductive Justice in Old Laws
By Katie Gu
In the post-Dobbs fight to safeguard reproductive healthcare, a new spotlight has been placed on two existing federal laws: the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA).
Guidance documents issued over the summer by federal agencies emphasize how these laws can be used to protect reproductive health privacy and access.
Fighting Diagnostic Discrimination and Stigma in Monkeypox
By Katie Gu
History recently repeated itself when technicians from two major laboratories refused to accept blood samples from patients testing for monkeypox.
This August, the U.S. saw the largest increase in monkeypox cases in the world. In the midst of a nearly 80% increase in U.S. cases, phlebotomists from Labcorp and Quest Diagnostics reportedly turned away potential monkeypox samples. Such refusals dangerously parallel instances of diagnostic discrimination against HIV/AIDS patients in the 1980s and 1990s.
Within both eras, such actions have fueled stigma, propagated misinformation, and encouraged scapegoating in the middle of public health crises.
The Fourth Amendment and the Post-Roe Future of Privacy
By Katie Gu
An April 2021 data privacy bill sponsored by Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) has taken on new urgency in the post-Roe Digital Age.
The bipartisan bill, The Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act, would close the current legal loophole through which the FBI, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Defense, Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the Internal Revenue Service, have repeatedly purchased Americans’ personal and consumer information from data brokers.
In the wake of the recent Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, this bill may play an important role in protecting reproductive health data against government overreach and new forms of surveillance technologies.