Standards for privacy of individually identifiable health information.

The Regulatory Studies Program (RSP) of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University is dedicated to advancing knowledge of regulations and their impacts on society. As part of its mission, RSP produces careful and independent analyses of agency rulemaking proposals from the perspective of the public interest. Thus, the program’s comments on the Department of Health and Human Service’s (HHS) proposed Standards for Privacy of Individually Identifiable Health Information do not represent the views of any particular affected party or special interest group, but are designed to protect the interests of American citizens. This comment extends and supersedes our comments of December 31, 1999.