Despite federal guidance, schools cite privacy laws to withhold info about COVID-19 cases – By Jayme Fraser, Joel Ebert, Sommer Brugal, CD Davidson-Hiers and Thomas B. Langhorne (USA Today) / Aug 9 2020
Thousands of American parents have already sent their children back to the classroom and millions more will soon join them amid fears about the raging pandemic and whether they’ll even be notified when coronavirus hits their campuses.
School districts, health departments and state agencies across the country have provided mixed messages about whether they will release information about coronavirus cases in students, teachers and staff at K-12 campuses.
Reporting by the USA TODAY Network also found little consistency in how schools and health departments plan to coordinate information and what, if anything, they will tell the broader public.
Many of these gatekeepers have pointed to medical and educational privacy laws as reasons to withhold even basic counts of coronavirus cases. That’s despite federal guidance saying those laws aren’t barriers to disclosure and legal experts who note that schools can share information as long as they don’t identify individuals.
Continue to article: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/investigations/2020/08/09/schools-cite-hipaa-hide-coronavirus-numbers-they-cant-do-that/3323986001/
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