Israel: Settlement in Class Action Suit on Patient Privacy

The District Court in Haifa, Israel, approved a settlement in a consumer class action suit filed against Clalit Health Services (Israel’s largest healthcare provider) and Dikla insurance company, alleging that the two organizations violated the privacy of Clalit patients. The suit alleged that Clalit provided patients' contact information to Dikla for the purpose of marketing Dikla’s long term care collective insurance, without their knowledge or consent.
 
Under the settlement, Clalit has undertaken not to disclose to Dikla information about its patients without obtaining their prior and explicit consent. The class action originally sought to recover 24 million NIS (approximately US $6,000,000) in damages. However, the settlement will have the defendants donate half a million NIS (approximately US $120,000) for medication for seriously ill children. Source: Globes (in Hebrew, by Efrat Aharoni).