HHS has dropped its appeal of a lawsuit from the American Hospital Association over the use of data trackers on hospital websites.
The federal health agency had appealed a judge's decision that HHS' Office of Civil Rights could not prohibit hospitals and health systems from deploying so-called pixel tracking technology on their public-facing websites. HHS filed a motion Aug. 29 to stop pursuing the case.
"The American Hospital Association is pleased that the Office for Civil Rights has decided not to appeal the district court's decision vacating the new rule adopted in its Online Tracking Technologies Bulletin," AHA General Counsel Chad Golder said in an Aug. 29 statement. "As the AHA repeatedly explained to OCR — both before and after OCR forced the AHA to file its lawsuit — this rule was a gross overreach by the federal government, imposed without any input from healthcare providers or the general public."
OCR ruled in 2022 that hospitals and health systems that used online trackers to research consumer behavior and transmitted the data to tech companies without the users' consent could be in violation of HIPAA. The AHA and two Texas health systems sued to overturn the rule, which a federal judge did in June. HHS appealed that decision Aug. 19 before withdrawing the request 10 days later.
Mr. Golder stated that hospitals can once again "safely share reliable, accurate healthcare information with the communities they serve without the fear of federal civil and criminal penalties." OCR told Becker's it has no comment on litigation.