Trump administration demands hospitals share emergency room records - CNN

What the report says

CNN, citing reporting by KFF Health News, reported that the Consumer Product Safety Commission is seeking detailed, personally identifiable emergency-room records from major hospital systems for a new injury surveillance program. An internal memo says the agency wants at least 100 hospitals to begin sending records by the end of the year to Konza Health, a private contractor, for analysis.

The CPSC traditionally tracks injuries linked to consumer products and supports recalls through the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System, a voluntary program in which participating hospitals generally submit product-injury data without patient identifiers. The new effort, according to documents, emails and interviews cited in the report, would sweep in records from all ER visits, including injuries not tied to consumer products, and could include names, addresses, diagnoses and other personal details.

Hospital lawyers and industry experts questioned whether the CPSC has authority to require the data, whether the information would be adequately protected, and whether the agency followed required procedures. CNN reported that federal law requires public notice and comment before collecting information from 10 or more entities, and a CPSC spokesperson acknowledged the public had not yet been notified. The spokesperson said the agency is modernizing its surveillance system and that the prior voluntary model limited the usefulness of the data.

The program comes during political and staffing turmoil at the CPSC after President Donald Trump fired its three Democratic board members. The report also places the effort in a broader context of Trump administration attempts to access medical information. The dispute matters because it pits product-safety surveillance and possible data modernization against patient privacy, hospital compliance risks and limits on federal collection of sensitive health records.