Less than an hour ago, leg­is­la­tion request­ed by Attor­ney Gen­er­al Bob Fer­gu­son that would pro­vide strong new pro­tec­tions for Wash­ing­to­ni­ans’ pri­vate health data won final pas­sage in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives, putting it a guber­na­to­r­i­al sig­na­ture away from becom­ing the law of the land in the Ever­green State.

By a vote of 57–40, the House vot­ed to con­cur in the Sen­ate amend­ments to House Bill 1155, prime spon­sored by Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Van­dana Slat­ter (D‑48th Dis­trict: Belle­vue, Red­mond, Kirk­land, Med­i­na, the Points communities.)

Sen­a­tor Man­ka Dhin­gra (D‑45th Dis­trict: Red­mond, Kirk­land, Sam­mamish, Duvall), a North­west Pro­gres­sive Foun­da­tion board­mem­ber, had the com­pan­ion bill in the Sen­ate and over­saw the draft­ing of the amendments.

Those amend­ments strength­ened the bill — as opposed to weak­en­ing it, which is the more com­mon sce­nario when a bill is changed by the oppo­site cham­ber — set­ting the stage for a sim­ple and straight­for­ward con­cur­rence vote in the House.

The Sen­ate’s changes, pro­posed by Dhin­gra’s com­mit­tee, restored the bill to its orig­i­nal­ly con­tem­plat­ed scope, with a strong pri­vate right of action. What that means is that if peo­ple find the pri­va­cy of their health data has been infringed upon, they can go to the courts to seek jus­tice them­selves, rather than hav­ing to rely on the Attor­ney General’s office as the sole enforcer of their rights.

“This law pro­vides Wash­ing­to­ni­ans con­trol over their per­son­al health data,” Fer­gu­son said in a state­ment. “Wash­ing­to­ni­ans deserve the right to decide who shares and sells their health data, and the free­dom to demand that cor­po­ra­tions delete their sen­si­tive health data — and will now have these protections.”

“Web­sites, apps and health track­ing devices lack the basic pro­tec­tions we’ve come to expect when shar­ing our per­son­al health data,” Slat­ter said.

“There is no way to con­sent or even know about it. We must pro­tect the data of Wash­ing­to­ni­ans and all who trav­el here. With­out a fed­er­al pol­i­cy, this is where we are and the first in the nation bill we need. I’m glad my col­leagues and the attor­ney gen­er­al are choos­ing to rise to the occa­sion in pro­tect­ing people’s right to pri­va­cy, per­son­al agency and safe med­ical care.”

“Peo­ple have a right to keep pri­vate health data pri­vate,” Dhin­gra said. “With the My Health My Data Act, Wash­ing­ton becomes the nation­al leader in inform­ing and obtain­ing con­sent from con­sumers when com­pa­nies col­lect, share and sell their health care data. It is cru­cial that peo­ple have the abil­i­ty to request that their pri­vate data be delet­ed once col­lect­ed, and this bill allows them to do so.”

New research released on April 4th by the North­west Pro­gres­sive Insti­tute at an event with Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Slat­ter, Sen­a­tor Dhin­gra, and Attor­ney Gen­er­al Fer­gu­son shows that HB 1155 is mas­sive­ly pop­u­lar. 76% sup­port the legislation’s pro­vi­sions, with sev­en out of ten vot­ers strong­ly sup­port­ive overall.

My Health, My Data is one of the most pop­u­lar ideas we have ever researched.

The House and Sen­ate are to be com­mend­ed for send­ing Gov­er­nor Inslee a strong bill that will be a mod­el for states through­out the coun­try. This is what real lead­er­ship looks like — and it comes at a crit­i­cal time for repro­duc­tive rights.

The roll call on final pas­sage in the House was as follows:

Roll Call
HB 1155
Con­sumer health data
Final Pas­sage as Amend­ed by the Senate
4/17/2023

Yeas: 57; Nays: 40; Excused: 1

Vot­ing Yea: Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Alvara­do, Bate­man, Berg, Bergquist, Berry, Bronoske, Callan, Chap­man, Chopp, Cortes, Davis, Doglio, Don­aghy, Duerr, Enten­man, Fari­var, Fey, Fitzgib­bon, Fos­se, Good­man, Gregerson, Hack­ney, Hansen, Klo­ba, Leav­itt, Lekanoff, Macri, Mena, Mor­gan, Orms­by, Orwall, Paul, Peter­son, Pol­let, Ramel, Ramos, Reed, Reeves, Ric­cel­li, Rule, Ryu, San­tos, Senn, Shavers, Sim­mons, Slat­ter, Springer, Stearns, Stonier, Street, Tay­lor, Thai, Tharinger, Tim­mons, Walen, Wylie, Jinkins

Vot­ing Nay: Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Abbarno, Barkis, Barnard, Caldier, Cham­bers, Chan­dler, Cheney, Chris­t­ian, Con­nors, Cor­ry, Cou­ture, Dent, Dye, Eslick, Goehn­er, Gra­ham, Grif­fey, Har­ris, Hutchins, Jacob­sen, Klick­er, Kretz, Low, May­cum­ber, McClin­tock, McEn­tire, Mos­bruck­er, Orcutt, Robert­son, Rude, San­dlin, Schmick, Schmidt, Steele, Stokes­bary, Volz, Walsh, Waters, Wilcox, Ybarra

Excused: Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Ortiz-Self

The vote on final pas­sage of HB 1155 was a par­ty-line vote, with Demo­c­ra­t­ic rep­re­sen­ta­tives sup­port­ive and Repub­li­cans opposed.

Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Lil­lian Ortiz-Self was excused.

The final ver­sion of HB 1155 would, if signed by Inslee:

• Estab­lish con­sumer rights of access, with­draw con­sent, and dele­tion regard­ing con­sumer health data.
• Require reg­u­lat­ed enti­ties and small busi­ness­es to obtain con­sent in order to col­lect, share, or sell con­sumer health data.
• Spec­i­fy reg­u­lat­ed enti­ty and small busi­ness oblig­a­tions regard­ing con­sumer health data pri­va­cy notice, access, and secu­ri­ty requirements.
• Pro­hib­it imple­ment­ing a geofence around an enti­ty that pro­vides in-per­son health care ser­vices to col­lect or track data from con­sumers or to send adver­tise­ments relat­ed to con­sumer health data.
• Exempt gov­ern­ment agen­cies, trib­al nations, and per­son­al infor­ma­tion gov­erned by cer­tain fed­er­al or state laws.
• Make vio­la­tions enforce­able under the Con­sumer Pro­tec­tion Act.

Our thanks to Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Slat­ter, Sen­a­tor Dhin­gra, and Attor­ney Gen­er­al Fer­gu­son for their lead­er­ship. With­out them, we would­n’t have got­ten a strong My Health, My Data Act this ses­sion. This is a great vic­to­ry for Washingtonians.